Melbourne Rebels hooker Jordan Uelese has been named for his first match in over month after recovering from an upper body injury.
The twenty-five-year-old’s inclusion shapes as a massive boost for a Melbourne Rebels’ side jostling for the final position in this year’s Super Rugby Pacific finals.
Rebels Media caught up with Uelese earlier today, ahead of his return to the field.
Q: Talk us though process on returning back to the field from injury?
JU: Available for selection this week, just had a little shoulder injury that kept me sidelined for a bit. I could’ve played a couple of weeks ago but unfortunately, I re-injured it again. The coaches and the medical staff decided for the longevity of the shoulder to just give it a few weeks. There’s no better way to come back than to play on Sunday against the Chiefs in front of our great fans.
Q: It would have been a tough review from Friday’s game against the Blues. What are the key messages coming out of that?
For us it’s all about our love and focusing on our defence. We were really embarrassed with our performance on the weekend, but we reviewed that really hard and trained today to consolidate everything that we need to do to make sure we don’t make the same mistakes.
Our first up tackles and getting around our system and having a great overall understanding of our systems. The boys are working really hard on the paddock and getting our technique right.
Q: When you speak to Michael Wells and Kevin Foote, and the rest of the team, accountability is the word that keeps cropping up. What goes on in that review?
We are all adults here and we all know what we have to do. For us our accountability is only as good as ourselves. When the coaches put faces to the stats and you see your name there, you see your stats and percentages, you get put to the sword and you know yourself that you’ve got to be really accountable. For us we have finally nailed accountability and putting a face to it.
Q: Do you notice that hunger to want to make up for last week and put a really good performance heading back to AAMI Park this weekend against the Chiefs.
The great thing about being a rugby player is you get to go out there again and showcase your skills and have a chance to show up and fix the problems you had the week before. For us it’s about picking up where we left off against Moana, and what better way to do it at home. There’s not going to be any AFL this Sunday, which is great for us to try and fill out the stadium and get support behind us. We’ve got 3 more games to go, finals are within sight, and we want to make the Top 8. A win this week will send us forward and we are doing everything we can to get there.
