THE Sea Eagles are playing a waiting game as they sweat on the fitness of experienced prop Jason King for the first round of the NRL season against bitter rivals the Storm.

The former State of Origin forward will not play in this evening’s trial against Parramatta at Brookvale Oval as he continues his comeback from a shoulder reconstruction.

He played only four games in 2013, missing the run to the grand final.

“We are aiming for him to be back in round one,” Sea Eagles coach Geoff Toovey told the Manly Daily.

“We’ll have to assess that in the next week or two.

“He is training well and started contact a week or so ago so he has a bit of work to do there before he gets a clearance from the doctor.”

King will be an even more important cog in the Manly forward machine this season after the departures of experienced front-rowers Joe Galuvao, Brent Kite and George Rose.

Toovey plans to give the more senior Sea Eagles about 40 minutes of game time this evening after they played in the third quarter of the first trial against Cronulla.

“We’ll get those combinations going particularly in that first half,” Toovey said.

The gates open at 4.45pm with the NYC game starting at 5pm. The first-grade trial kicks off at 7.30pm.

Jon Geddes
Manly Daily

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