Warringah Rats coach Darren Coleman doesn’t believe complacency will be an issue as his side prepares to defend it’s Shute Shield title.

The Rats beat Northern Suburbs in front of a packed house at North Sydney Oval just over five months ago to claim the club’s first premiership since 2005 and while Coleman said the group certainly enjoyed their celebrations, he thinks the squad is in a better position this year than they were at the same point in 2017.

“It’s always a bit of a concern, complacency and I’m a worrier by nature so I’m always looking for signs of it but we’ve spoken about it and we’re conscious of it and the boys are definitely training hard,” Coleman said.

“All our meterage and the numbers from our GPS trackers are up quite a bit from last year’s preseason, we’re definitely working harder than last year and that’s a good sign,”

After a three week break over Christmas, the Rats have been training four days a week for the past month and will play three Sevens tournaments and three trial matches ahead of round one.

Warringah sent two men’s teams and a women’s team to last weekend’s Hamilton 7s in Newcastle and will play at the Lake Macquarie and Kiama tournaments in the coming fortnight.

“It’s a great way to introduce our new players into the club, it provides the boys with a Sevens interest with a genuine program and pathway and it gets us match fit and working on certain skills that Sevens requires,” Coleman said.

After a week off in early March, Warringah’s first and second grade sides will head to a pre-season camp, which includes a trial match against Eastern Suburbs, while they’re lower grade sides will head west to play Temora in a trial match.

“There’s an association there with Lachie Ward, he spent a lot of the last year of his life working in Temora and he got involved with the local rugby club there. So it’s great that our threes and fours are heading out there for a run around and a good weekend with those guys.”

Warringah will then play QLD Premier Rugby champions University of Queensland in the Australian Club Championship at Rat Park on March 17, before a final trial match against Gordon a week later.

“We want to be known as the best club team in Australia, so we’ll put out our best side on the park against UQ and we’re definitely playing to win,” the coach said.

While Warringah have retained the majority of last year’s premiership squad, a handful of players have moved on, opening up the door for a number of lower graders and colts to push into the higher grades.

“If you look at our grand final 23, we’ve lost three or four from that side and then from our training squad of 30, probably six or seven guys. We’ve replaced them though and we’re comfortable that we’ve added guys to the squad that will fill the void left by those that we’ve lost,” Coleman said.

“Ben Marr is looking really sharp after coming up from colts last year. He’s a fullback or flyhalf. Ezra Chee Kam also comes up, he played NSW U20s last year and I’m hoping he’ll be pushing to play in the higher grades.

“Then you’ve got guys like Andrew Davies, our young second grade lock. He’s 203cm tall and he’s put on 12 kilos over summer heading into his second year out of colts so I think he’ll continue to progress, as will Harley Attwater. He’s a utility back and has had a really strong preseason so hopefully he will be rewarded.”

Coleman said the buzz from last year’s premiership was still well and truly alive north of the spit bridge, however the coach admitted he’ll need to find a way to freshen up his players at some point ahead of a gruelling Shute Shield campaign.

“We need to find a way to keep them motivated and interested. A lot of the systems are in place already and that’s good for familiarity but if the players aren’t continually learning and being stimulated in training, there’s a chance boredom can kick in.”

Warringah will compete alongside Eastwood, Randwick and West Harbour sides at this weekend’s Lake Macquarie Sevens, which begins at 8am on Saturday morning at Walters Park.