Jason Taumalolo adding more to his game as he seeks to improve
After last year’s season of disappointment, Jason Taumalolo pushing himself to the edge to add new weapons to his attack and get back to his best for the Cowboys.
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Jason Taumalolo has revealed he will add more attacking weapons to his game this season as the Tongan torpedo prepares to have a Sonny Bill Williams-style impact at the Cowboys.
Touted the next Sonny Bill as a teenager, Taumalolo could receive more game time on the edges this year and is keen to deliver the firepower that made Kiwi dual international Williams one of the NRL’s superstars.
Taumalolo has spent the past four seasons operating as a battering ram “middle” but is likely to skirt wider this year, starting on Saturday night when he wears the No.11 jumper in a trial against Melbourne in Mackay.
Former Roosters forward Williams terrorised NRL rivals with his size and skill on the fringes and with Cowboys recruit Josh McGuire to shore up the midfield this year, Taumalolo is set to feature in a more versatile role.
In his formative years in first grade, Taumalolo struggled with defensive reads on the edges, but has warned the NRL has yet to see the best of him as he looks to add the type of offload that made Sonny Bill so lethal.
“I can’t wait to get back out there — if anything I want to get better,” Taumalolo said.
“Greeny still has to work out my exact role but I want to add more offloads to my game.
“In the last few years I guess I’ve had a target on my back and every side has numbers to gang-tackle me and have the big forwards shutting me down.
“It’s something I’m working to overcome. I want to be more consistent this season and play to the standards I expect.”
Taumalolo’s indifferent 2018 campaign was a by-product of North Queensland’s shock free fall from grand finalists to 13th place last season.
While Taumalolo was by no means poor, his average of 179 running metres per game was shy of the remarkable 206m mark he produced to spearhead the Cowboys’ fairytale charge to the 2017 decider.
The Tongan international turns 26 this May and says he has reached a midpoint of his NRL career where his consistency must match his matchwinning class.
“I dropped off a bit last year,” he said.
“Given the year we had, I wasn’t playing great footy and I definitely dropped in form. It was a disappointing year overall.
“I had a few games where I tried to pick myself up but it was one of those years where things didn’t go our way and I found it hard to dig out of it.
“It was a rough year, not just for myself, but for the club.”
Taumalolo is confident the Cowboys can recover from the retirement of Johnathan Thurston to challenge for the title.
“It’s going to be a huge loss not having ‘JT’ there,” he said.
“But now we have some young players coming through and I think if we have a better run with injuries, we can be back there competing with the top teams.
“Hopefully after the off-season we’ve had, everything gels together and we can hit back with a good season.”
Originally published as Jason Taumalolo adding more to his game as he seeks to improve
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