There's going to be a lot of rugby league in York this weekend with the International York 9s going on at Heworth as well as our home game against Blackpool on Saturday (kick-off 5.30pm).

I've never been to the York 9s but I think it's a great festival of rugby league and it gets a lot of teams involved. I'm hoping to get down there on Sunday and have a look at the teams who have made it through to the final stages.

It brings teams together from different nations and it's getting quite a good following. It has forecast big crowds and I am sure it will be a quality event.

I have never been directly involved with 9s rugby, although I played in the Wigan 7s for a few years when I was with Sheffield. That was obviously seven-a-side so a bit more difficult because you have less players and therefore more gaps to close.

It's an interesting game to play. As a player, you have to be very well focused in both attack and defence as things happen very quickly. The game is more about pace and quality skills, and it helps if you are in good physical shape.

The teams in 9s need to be pretty fit because they have four players less than normal. It's quite demanding defensively and you need to be able to go the full length of the pitch when carrying the ball.

A lot of breakaway tries occur in 9s rugby and that is what makes it an exciting game to watch. It is played on a full-size pitch which allows more spaces to attack.

Some people might think that starting in 9s could be easier for new players but I would imagine that for somebody who has not played before it is a bit more difficult due to the pace of the game.

A lot of it depends on who the opposition are. In the Wigan 7s, we were playing the likes of Wigan and St Helens and other clubs at a professional level.

In the York 9s, there are teams such as West Indies Wahoos, South Asia Bulls and top amateur teams like Sharlston Rovers, so I imagine the quality is getting better every year.

At the Knights, we use quite a lot of small-sided games in training.

We have themed games which look at one particular area we are trying to improve such as support play or tackle technique for example.

We also look at defensive work such as picking up line speed. We have quite a lot of games which are themed to suit the skill or situation which we are working on.

For example, if we thought our marker-play was poor, we would work on that skill and then take it into a small-sided game.

One of the teams may be given six tackles to defend but if an error occurs, the tackle count reverts to six so they have to work even harder.

Most professional teams will be using small-sided games in training in order to improve.

As far as this weekend goes, it's going to be great for the area to have so much rugby league going on over the two days.

Of course the best thing is it's not far from Heworth to Huntington Stadium so hopefully some of the fans watching the 9s will be inspired to come and watch the Knights.

Updated: 10:32 Wednesday, June 01, 2005