Pirates ready for toughest of starts

CHRIS Stirling sees today’s contest at Mennaye Field as a chance to gauge how his squad are jelling when they face ‘elite’ opposition in Ealing Trailfinders.

Having returned to Cornish Pirates from Yorkshire Carnegie, Stirling kicks off the league campaign with the visit of last season’s Championship runners-up followed by Newcastle in round three – teams Stirling hopes to soon be competing with at the top of the table.

Pirates have named a strong side but No.9 Jean Baptist Bruzulier is unavailable, having just become a dad again.

“The plan for us is to win the Championship but we’re probably not ready to do that currently,” he said. “We’re at the start of the process of getting to where we want to get to.

“To play two of the elite teams in the first three weeks is going to give us a really good understanding of exactly where we are. ”

Stirling left a tumultuous situation at Carnegie to sign a three-year contract at Pirates, where he acted as high performance manager between 2009 and 2012, and knows full well the challenge that Ealing will present.

“They’ve been consistently up in the top two of the competition for the last few years,” Stirling added.

“We were at full strength when we played them up at Headingley last season and they beat us, they were outstanding. I know what we’re up against: a big strong side that will come at us and contest for the ball in all areas. We are going to have be at our absolute best.”

New Ealing front row addition Craig Trenier said: “Pirates are going to be one of the top teams in the league this year and we want to go there and send out a statement.”

Ealing change three from last week’s side. Nathan Fowles and Craig Willis return as half-backs, with Jack Tovey in the midfield.