Tom Gilbert: ‘We will be honest, hardworking, humble’

New Dolphins NRL Captain Tom Gilbert has promised supporters the team will continue to be honest, hardworking and humble as they represent them in the 2025 NRL season.

Gilbert was speaking at the club’s season launch at Hamilton, which brought almost 600 sponsors, supporters, families, players and staff together tonight (February 28).

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Incoming Dolphins NRL Head Coach Kristian Woolf revealed the club’s leadership group including Gilbert as their Captain and Kaufusi as Vice-Captain at the event.

They will be supported by Mark Nicholls and Kenny Bromwich as the squad’s senior leaders.

“They’re outstanding men. I love their presence in the group, I love the way they carry themselves as men on the field and off the field, the way they prepare, the way they train and what it means to them to be a Dolphins player,” Woolf said.

He believes in the one captain model of leadership with a group of strong leaders to support him.

Woolf said he had the privilege of coaching Kaufusi when he was 18 and had been impressed by the man he had become and his leadership qualities.

About Gilbert, he said he didn’t think there was anyone who trained harder and carried himself off the field as well as him.

“He exemplifies everything we want the club to be about and everything we want our playing group to be about,” Woolf said.

Gilbert, 24, had been widely tipped to step into the role given his natural leadership qualities and work ethic.

“For me this is a huge privilege. A lot of people might think this club has a short history … the NRL club has, that’s for sure, but there’s a long history of this club,” he said.

Gilbert told the audience the club’s history had been forged by the players who had gone before the current playing group, including inaugural captain Jesse Bromwich.

He assured supporters the squad had “done the work” and were “ready to go this year”.

“The one thing I know about this group, our group, your club … is that we’re committed to being the best we can each and every week. (We will) be honest, be hardworking, be humble … we’ll show it and we’ll continue to do it the best we can all year round,” he said.

'They're going to be very hard to beat'

Gilbert's sentiments were shared by Woolf who said the team had worked hard during preseason training.

“People talk a lot about culture in clubs … it’s a word that gets thrown around a lot but culture is the people you have within the club. We’ve got some really good people and a really good culture within the club,” Woolf said.

He said the playing group was an outstanding group of men.

“I talk about that a lot, but I think it’s really important. If you want to be a good teammate, you’ve got to be a good man first and foremost,” Woolf said.

“We’ve worked them really hard through the preseason. We’ve asked a bit more than we have in previous years. The testing results they did today certainly show they’ve done a great job with that and achieved really high results.

“I really believe in the preseason that we’ve done and what these blokes have put together so far. We’re in a great position to start the year really well.”

He said he had been around long enough to know you can’t promise results, with so many factors affecting a season.

“What I do know is the work these blokes have put in, they’re in the best position they could be in and I’m really confident they’re going to start the year well. I’m also really confident they’re a team you’re going to be really proud of,” Woolf explained.

“They’re shown through the preseason that they’re going to work hard and they’re going to compete for everything. They’re going to be very hard to beat off the back of that.”

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By Dominika Lis