After falling agonisingly short of a second straight Shute Shield title, veteran Gordon backrower Jack Margin believes a younger but more cohesive group can go one better in 2023.

“We’ve got a lot of guys that have been here for two, three plus years now so the continuity over summer has been really good. We haven’t had to start with the basics or build knowledge and we’ve been able to move through things fairly quickly,” Margin told Rugby News.

“Even with the colts coming into grade, they’ve been around the place for a few years now and they know what they need to do and how we like to play.”

Margin said he still didn’t like to think too much about the cold, wet afternoon at Leichhardt Oval last September.

“It was a pretty depressing day to be honest.