Penrith captain Peter Wallace says his departure from Brisbane under then-coach and now Penrith mentor Anthony Griffin is all in the past and is looking forward to getting back on the field to join his teammates following knee surgery.
The Penrith junior hardly missed a game for Brisbane in his six seasons there from 2008 to 2013 before Griffin released him in a move that ended up paying dividends through the rise of Ben Hunt, who helped guide the side to the 2015 Grand Final.
While his departure was somewhat acrimonious at the time, Wallace told NRL.com that that was all water under the bridge and he would have no issues working with Griffin again at Penrith.
Speaking while his teammates completed their second training run of the 2016 pre-season, Wallace watched on just 13 weeks after surgery to repair a ruptured ACL – his second straight season-ending ACL injury – and added he hopes to begin running next week and be back in full training post-Christmas.
"That was three years ago now. I've moved on, I'm sure he (Griffin) has too," Wallace said of his departure from Red Hill.
"It's one of those things in footy, it happens every day, it's all good."
Wallace added there was "not at all" any need for he and Griffin to address what had happened then or to clear the air.
"Everything that happened happened then, it was three years ago, it's a fair time in footy and all water under the bridge."
Wallace's immediate goal is to complete his recovery from knee surgery 13 weeks ago.
"Next week I can start running on the treadmill, I'll have a couple of weeks on that then progress to the field," he said.
"If everything goes smoothly I should be right to go at the Christmas break then when everyone comes back I'll be in full training."
While the pre-season is just two sessions old so far, he said everything had gone smoothly so far and the team had had a good hit-out on their return on Monday. The new-look coaching staff will need to do their best to try and avoid the apocalyptic injury toll that cruelled Penrith's 2015 ambitions and Wallace said that was already front of mind.
"There's no doubt that if we stay injury free we can at least make the eight and hopefully go deep in the finals [in 2016] so I know that will be everyone's goal and hopefully with a bit of luck keep everyone healthy," he said.
"Everyone's excited to be back and looking forward to getting back into it."
