Shellharbour's Jai Field will be the first to admit the past few months have been some of the toughest of his rugby league career, both physically and mentally.
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However, throughout it all, the 23-year-old has kept a positive mindset, to ensure his return from a torn left hamstring goes as smoothly as possible.
The severe injury occurred just 19 minutes into Field's Wigan Warriors debut in the English Super League.
"Throughout my career to date, I've always been quite durable and never missed more than two weeks here and there through injury," Field said.
"This is the first major injury I've had to deal with and although at first, it was really tough being over here by myself (as his partner Brooke arrived a couple of weeks later), the club has looked after me extremely well.
"Obviously there's been times of frustration over the past few months but I've just kept my head down and stayed as positive as I can.
"In all honesty, it's gone quite quickly and as it's my job. I've tried to be as diligent as I can throughout the whole process - the club brought me over here for a reason and I want to repay their faith in me."
His memory of when injury struck is clear.
"I can remember defending our own line and Leigh was trying to run some shape against us before the ball hit the deck," Field said.
"I tried to pick the ball up at three-quarter pace and as it was still bouncing and kicked up on me really late - forcing me to pick it up off my toes.
"It was like my legs were going too quick for my body and I couldn't get up head up in time, so it locked out the whole leg and ruptured my hamstring.
"I knew straight away something bad had happened because I'd heard a pop and couldn't get off the deck.
"The trainers got to me and asked if my knee was okay, because generally when a leg bends that way, people hyper-extend their knee."
Once the Group Seven Rugby League product found out the severity of the injury, which would sideline him to close to 18 weeks, the devastation really started to set in.
"It definitely not the way I wanted to start my Wigan career and it's super disappointing but injuries happen in sport," he said.
The former St George Illawarra Dragon and Parramatta Eel then set about starting his long road to recovery, starting with surgery just a couple of days after the incident at Emerald Headingley Stadium.
Field, following the operation, was stuck in a brace for the first six weeks, with some partial weight-barring allowed on his crutches, as he wasn't allowed to activate any part of his leg.
After six weeks, he was removed from the brace and started little bits of rehabilitation, to try and get his strength, flexibility and movement back.
"During this six-week block, I was doing light exercises like knee-slide movements, trying to get that leg moving again, as it had been locked up at 60 degrees for more than a month," he said.
"I also did some activation work with my VMO (vastus medialis oblique), as it felt like my whole quad had started to deteriorate."
That stage lasted for another six weeks. At the three-month mark, the speedy fullback began lower bodyweight exercises and light running (originally on a treadmill before transitioning to grass), where he is expected to progress quite quickly if his body responds well - as well as hitting all his strength and speed markers set out by the club.
"The trainers will measure my progress via the GPS data before giving me the green-light to resume regular training and eventually being allowed to play again," said Field, who had just been doing upper body weights up until the 10-week mark.
"As much as it's great to be running again, I still feel like I have my training wheels on, as I'm only allowed to run at 60 per cent.
"Hamstrings are funny and can be misleading sometimes - you look at the field and feel like you can run like your normal self again.
"That's the toughest part right now because it feels good but you're not allowed to push it too much, which is why this stage is the most difficult to deal with thus far.
"I've now progressed to rhythm running, where I'll build for 10-20 metres into a stride for about 50 metres - which is all timed because I want to be running close to 40 metres per 10 seconds at this stage.
"As I continue to improve, that will quicken gradually.
"My trainers have been telling me with hamstrings you want to predict the worst-case scenario because in the position I'm going to play on the field, I'm going to need to get to top speed quickly.
"Before I even think about playing, I've got to be able to sprint 100 metres at full speed and different angles without any constraints, because that's what I might have to deal with in an actual game."
While he is still more than a month away from returning, the Warilla High School alumnus has targeted the club's August 1 clash, coincidently against the Leigh Centurions, at DW Stadium.
"Going off the timeframe following the surgery and how my body has progressed, we are working towards the first weekend in August," Field said.
"The game against Leigh will be just shy of 18 weeks, so if all goes to plan over the next month or so, I should be right to return then, which is exciting."
If Field does return around that date, that will give him more than half a dozen games to get himself up to game-speed before the fifth-placed Warriors start its finals change.
"It would be great to get eight games under my belt before finals, allowing me to develop some cohesion with fellow spine players such as Jackson Hastings and Thomas Leuluai, as well as develop my own sort of rhythm," Field, who is expecting to play fullback after Bevan French's season-ending hamstring injury, said.
"This is the longest I've spent on the sidelines because when August does roll around, I would have only played 19 minutes of footy in 10 months, so I know there will be a little rust there at the start.
"However, I'm confident once I get a couple of games under my belts, I'll be able to string some strong performances together for the club and fans, who I'm really excited to play in front of as COVID restrictions start to ease."
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