Only three games into his Dolphins career, Thomas Flegler looks right at home at his new club and is even finding his voice as a leader amongst an experienced forward pack.
Flegler could be heard at training on Wednesday addressing his side during a drinks break, warning that another slow start could be costly against the in-form Wests Tigers on Saturday.
“I'm not naturally a loud person, I do get a bit nervous (and) just have to force myself to talk sometimes,” Flegler said.
“I guess it's probably been a little bit of a work-on, probably just trying to be a little bit more vocal.
“But most importantly, (I try to work on) just going out there and having a good performance both individually and as a team; coming out with the win is the most important thing.”
At the Dolphins, Flegler has a great example to follow in fellow prop and captain Jesse Bromwich - another man generally of few words - who is helping the former Bronco to develop his own leadership skills.
“He's not the biggest talker either,” Flegler said. “So I just observe his actions and how he leads the team around.
“I've seen him play a lot of footy and obviously he's played a lot of footy himself.
“He is really good to train alongside, you learn a lot out of him, just from his maturity and how he handles big game situations and being under pressure.
“I think that's a pretty obvious one right there (that being a leader) is something that I've strive to do in the future.
“It's a good role, it's a good challenge.
“It's something to work towards and you just keep improving each week and you never know what could happen.”
Flegler is set to play his 100th NRL game on Saturday, a special milestone that even he admits has taken a bit longer than expected, with run ins with the NRL Judiciary seeing him sit out more games than he would have liked.
But in a sign of his growing maturity, Flegler has been working on his discipline to ensure he’s on the field more when his team needs him the most.
“It’s pretty cool to rack up 100 games in the NRL, hopefully a few more to come.
“Obviously it's a big milestone… it's probably taken a bit longer, but over the last few years I've gotten a bit better on the discipline side of things and hopefully I can continue that.
“I missed a few games with suspension, but I'm on to new things now.”
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