“IT is a massive privilege and an honour to captain this club.”

So said York City Knights’ Will Jubb after being named captain for last week’s pre-season friendly against Hull FC.

Jubb has been a regular starter for the Knights since making his loan move from Hull Kingston Rovers into a permanent one in 2018.

The hooker has been a key part of York’s Betfred League One title win and third-placed play-off finish in the Betfred Championship the following season.

Head coach James Ford opted to make the 24-year-old the skipper in the absence of regular captain Chris Clarkson through injury for the first-ever game at the LNER Community Stadium.

“That was massive and it really means a lot to me,” reflected Jubb. “It’s a massive privilege and an honour to captain this club.

“I’ve been here a while now and the club really means a lot to me. To get the honour of captaining the team, especially being the first game at the new stadium, is something that I will keep with me for the rest of my life.

“When I found out, I was buzzing. I was ringing my grandma, my grandad and my dad. My whole family were really proud, so it was a big thing for me and I’m glad to have been able to do it.”

Despite falling to a 28-22 defeat against the Betfred Super League contenders, York were able to take plenty of positives from their sole warm-up match.

At one point they were 22 points adrift, but they rallied to finish just one score behind and were very much in the ascendency at full time.

The late comeback is typical of the Knights in recent seasons.

Jubb said: “I think it’s a characteristic of any York side.You don’t give in and you’re resilient.

“I think showed that in abundance, we never gave in, we worked ourselves back into the game and that will stand us in good stead for the season ahead.

“I think it comes from how we train. We train really hard and try to build that resilient mentality - it’s something that we talk about a lot. That has got us over the line on a few occasions, even going back to the promotion year (in 2018).

“It’s a really good characteristic of any side but it’s something that we really strive to be good at at York.

“I don’t think it does any good for Fordy’s blood pressure or heart rate though,” he joked.

Ahead of the start of the new competitive season, which begins on Friday in the Betfred Challenge Cup at Sheffield Eagles, Jubb felt the Hull fixture perfectly prepared the Knights for the challenges ahead.

He added: “Hull are a good side and they’re going to be challenging at the top of Super League this year so it’s a brilliant test for us and it shows where we need to get to and where we need to get better, so we’ll be looking at that in video and making sure that we put it right.

“To get the chance to test yourself against teams like Hull FC is what you want when you play rugby.

“You want to be playing to the best standard that you can and it’s a great test because we want to be pushing ourselves and getting in there against the teams that we want to be playing.”

After a pandemic-hit year out, a return to action, particularly at a new stadium was welcome.

“It was just good to be back and nice to back in the swing of things,” said the hooker. “We’ve certainly missed it, even though with everything going on we can understand it.

“Once we started playing, it was like it had never been away.

“Obviously, this was a massive occasion and to be able to play at this stadium is fantastic.”