North Wagga welcome back Mitch Mattingly from Coolamon

Mattingly spent last season at Coolamon, where he managed a handful of first grade games and missed the reserve grade premiership with a broken collarbone.

A North Wagga junior, the Saints are happy to have Mattingly back after already welcoming Matt McGowan, Will McGowan and Ash Bennett to the club this off-season.

Mattingly had already managed a handful of first grade appearances at North Wagga prior to his departure so Papworth is happy to have the youngster back at McPherson Oval.

"He's a North Wagga junior and went out to Coolamon for a year. His mates he grew up with are still at the club," Papworth said.

"Unfortunately he didn't cash in on the twos premiership out there because he busted his collarbone in the final they won to get into the grand final. He was in and out of first grade at the end of the year.

He'll be good. Just a young, quick fella. He'll probably slot in with the mids and spend time at half-forward. We'll get him in one of those running rotations I reckon.

"It's great, he's had a bit of that RFL experience and comes back and he's a one-pointer, which is good."

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The Saints have been training unofficially for the last fortnight.

They had the final round bye in the Farrer League this year so were finished by the first week in August.

That prompted Papworth and the Saints to get going early.

"We've been training for two weeks now. Just semi-formal. Not really super official," he said.

"Just because we finished so early, we were done by the start of August so the boys were a bit keen.

"We're just doing a couple of running sessions for whoever can turn up. We had double figures both nights and both nights were different blokes, which was good.

"It's just getting the group back together and touching base with each other."

North Wagga underwent a rebuilding season this year and won just the one game, finishing as Farrer League wooden spooners.

But they've recruited well so far, only adding to their list without the loss of any players.

Papworth hopes the Saints can still add another player or two on board.

"We're still talking to a couple of others," he said.

"You've got to keep your eye on the points a little bit. Last year we didn't have to worry but now we've signed a couple up, it's something that you have to watch."

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