Bradford Bulls back rower Whitehead free to go on Tiger hunt (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Bradford Bulls back rower Elliott Whitehead can't wait to unleash six month of pent-up frustration on Castleford Tigers

10:50am Thursday 9th February 2012 in Sport By Ross Heppenstall

Not much has been seen or heard of Elliott Whitehead in recent months, but the Bulls second rower took centre stage at Tong yesterday.

The media visited the club’s training HQ to hear Mick Potter’s thoughts ahead of Sunday’s trip to Castleford.

Whitehead, 22, was also in demand for interviews and, if he had an extra spring in his step and a smile on his face, then it was with good reason.

The clash with Ian Millward’s side will be his first outing since the end of a lengthy five-game ban for biting the arm of an opponent during the home defeat to Hull KR last August.

Whitehead spoke of having learnt his lesson and of a steely determination to reproduce the kind of form which earned him a call-up to the England Knights last season, only for his ban to curtail any involvement.

He claims to have no recollection of the incident but nevertheless admitted: “I was disappointed with what I did but I’ve learned from it and it won’t be happening again.

“It’s been frustrating in the past few weeks, watching the lads and not being able to play myself.

“I just need to get my match fitness back up and concentrate on playing week in, week out, and hopefully I’ll be playing good rugby again.

“Getting the England Knights call-up was a confidence boost last year but this year is a different year.

“I just need to get out there playing for the Bulls – and playing well – and and hopefully Steve McNamara will pick me for England again.”

Whitehead, one of Super League’s most promising back rowers, certainly paid a heavy price for his misdemeanour.

As well as sitting out the last month of the season, he reckons the punishment amounted in practical terms to a nine-game ban because he was not allowed to play in any of his club’s pre-season friendlies – under the terms of his suspension – as well as last Sunday’s Super League opener against Catalan Dragons.

Now he is ready to unleash several months of pent-up frustration against Castleford as the Bulls look to bounce back from last weekend’s defeat.

“The team had a disappointing season last year but hopefully we can do better this time around and get into the play-offs,” said Whitehead, who looks certain to replace the injured John Bateman on Sunday.

“It was hard watching the lads against Catalan because you know they are capable of doing the business.

“When little mistakes happen that shouldn’t be happening, it’s frustrating.

“We’ve got a lot of young lads in our squad and they all have the ability to become good Super League players.

“John Bateman is unbelievable really for his age in terms of his strength and how he plays the game.”

Whitehead is raring to go ahead of Sunday’s match against a Tigers outfit who kicked off their own campaign with an impressive win at Salford.

He added: “I’ve just been doing a bit of cardio to keep my fitness up, while the rest of the boys have been doing skills and team runs.

“I’ll probably blow a little this weekend but it’s match fitness that I need. Hopefully I’ll get that in the next few weeks and get back to where I was last year.

“What’s my best position? I thought it was back row but I didn’t mind playing centre last year. People said I played well there, but I’ll play anywhere as long as I’m involved.”

Whitehead appeared to vent his frustration about the club’s training schedule on the social networking site Twitter earlier this week.

But he insisted: “I tweeted about me not being organised, somebody just took it the wrong way!

“It was nothing to do with training – it was just me not being organised in a morning – and I’m looking forward to playing against Cas now.