Rugby League: Warriors utility Adam Keighran suffers long term injury on eve of season re-start

Adam Keighran in action during round two. Photosport

The New Zealand Warriors have suffered a third injury in four days as preparation for the re-started NRL season takes another hit.

Utility back Adam Keighran has joined the growing injury list after suffering a knee injury in a training session in Tamworth on Monday night.

Prop Leeson Ah Mau (pectoral muscle) and lock Jazz Tevaga (knee) have already suffered long-term injury blows in Tamworth after the club had already lost prop Bunty Afoa and hooker Jackson Frei to injuries early in the year.

Keighran is expected to have surgery this week and faces an extended period on the sideline, the club says.

The 2019 rookie made his seventh NRL appearance replacing an unavailable Peta Hiku in the centres in the second-round clash against Canberra before the 2020 season was suspended.

It leaves the Warriors in a precarious position in terms of player stocks as they near the end of their quarantine time in Tamworth before next Saturday's game against the Dragons.

Cronulla Sharks great Paul Gallen, who retired last year, has even hinted he'd be up to running out for the Warriors if they needed his help.

Warriors CEO Cameron George said other NRL clubs had offered players on loan but it was brushed back by the competition. That leaves retired players as the best option if the Warriors needed any help.

Gallen, who retired last season after playing 348 games for the Sharks, said he would consider putting on the Warriors jersey.

"The Warriors have done such an amazing job to get over here to Australia, so many sacrifices to get the game going again, you'd like to think we could help them out as much as possible," Gallen told 2GB on Tuesday.

"I tell you what, we've got until June 30 and I heard Billy Slater say he'd come back and play, Sam Thaiday today said he'd come back and play.

"I reckon between the three of us you'd get 10 or 15 games out, so why not, give me a call.

"The sacrifices they made, I would consider it."

George said discussions will continue with the NRL about the possibility of loaning a player.

"We've been declined already from the NRL for loan players. So were going to have a second discussion with them," George said.

"We've got significant injuries in one particular part of our squad, in key positions. So to simply say 'You've still got 28 players', well they all can't play front row.

"So we need to go back to the drawing table with the NRL and give them a very clear understanding of who we have and what we don't have available, particularly in the middle."

An NRL spokesman said that player loans were "against the rules of the competition"