John Cartwright sat down for his first Hull FC pre-match press conference on Tuesday afternoon, with the Black and Whites kicking off their Super League campaign at Catalans Dragons on Friday night. Here’s everything he had to say from the MKM Stadium.

Ready for Super League

I think we're more than ready. We've had a really good and long preparation. We've got a lot of new players in key positions, so that's always going to be a work in progress, but in terms of how we sit at the moment, we couldn't be happier with the training that we've done.

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The pre-season campaign

At the start, it was a bit like walking into the unknown, I suppose, finalising a roster. A few of the guys got in a little bit later than others, so the first job was to see where they were at physically. We were pretty happy with that, but the pre-season has been pretty mean, and physically, I don't think we could have got them in any better shape.

We've had a long pre-season. The players had a six-week break, and that brought us back at the start of November. I think we were the first team back to training, so we've had a good block of the pre-season together. We've been fortunate because of the length of training we've done that we could rest up a little bit in the middle. But certainly after Christmas, we've got in everything that we needed to do. Another game would have been nice, but we've come through the two games we've had uninjured and ready for round one.

Players connecting together

It's been one of the most pleasing things to watch – they are trying to buy into what we're doing, which is a team-first environment. Just to see the younger and older blokes mix and form their connections and relationships has been good. That's all tested under a pretty controlled environment. When you start playing, there's a lot of uncontrollables out there. That's the challenge – to make sure we stay a tight-knit group.

Last week’s game against York Acorn

It was a physical game. It was a tougher game than what I thought it would be. I didn't really know what to expect, and I only went on what I've been told. The pitch was very muddy. It was a different surface from what we've been training on, and it was a miserable, horrible day, but the players applied themselves really well. They got through it, they played tough, and they scored a few tries at the back end of each half.

Stepping up for Super League

We're going to have to be better than both trials, but there have been some really pleasing aspects of the trials, but they are only trials. The real acid test will see where we sit in the grand scheme of things. Catalans away from home, I don't think it can get much harder than that.

Change in mentality

It's been a total change: a voice change, a staff change, a change in environment, and a change in what we actually do day to day. Training hard and mental toughness can go hand in hand. We've just got to make sure that the players are in the now; whatever happens on the field, they can't be wandering back to what has happened in the past.

We've addressed that. It's a funny one; if you talk about it too much, you can make too much of a thing of it. Since we got together, it's been all about improving, getting better, and being ready for the season ahead.

Senior influences

They've been massive, in particular Zak Hardaker, Aidan Sezer, and Jordan Rapana; those guys have really stood out for me as far as leadership is concerned. John Asiata is also a great leader and a great team man. Spread against those young guys who got some game time last year are some older, harder heads who are going to help us out.

Squad shape up

We've got an idea of what the squad will be. I can't fault anyone who has played. They've played with energy, and they've attempted to do what we asked of them. We've made some errors along the way, and we'll continue to do that, but if we keep applying ourselves to the effort parts of the game, then I'm sure we'll compete with everyone.

Tough selections

It's always hard. There are 17 happy guys of 30 odd players. It's about building a team environment – you want the players not playing to be upset, but as long as they're upset in the right way; they're training hard and providing good opposition for the team that is going to play, then their chance will come at some point.

Putting training into games

Training is one thing, and going into a game is a totally different scenario. They've all played a lot of football over their careers with some really experienced players. But it's the nervous part of the wait, I suppose, to see how we handle that first game.

I'm confident with what we've done, and I'm confident in the players that we have. What we regard as success, we'll talk about that after the game, but we're going over there to win, that's for sure.

A look at Catalans

Andy Last was on the coaching staff there last year, but they've brought in some new players as well. They've recruited really well from overseas. I can't see their style changing too much, but it's one thing to know what they're going to do and an entirely new thing to try to stop it. They've got some powerful boys, and Luke Keary is still one of the better halves going around in the NRL. They're going to be a handful.