First in Cayless’ in-tray will be finding the key to unlock the best form of influential half-back Mikey Lewis.
On too many occasions last season, it was a case of if you could stop Lewis, you could stop the Robins entirely.
Cayless will need to tap into Lewis, as well as finding more creativity on a consistent basis from the other backs at his disposal if former Man of Steel Lewis is misfiring.
Despite the focus on evolving the current playing staff, the Hull KR board do not want a ‘Willie Peters mark two’ type of coach, even if the Australian guided the club to their first league championship in 40 years.
Cayless is open on having held conversations with Peters over recent months.
The former New Zealand international says Peters was clear on how much “care and love” is put into the club by the staff, highlighting the support he felt from the board was one of the key reasons in taking the job.
“When this opportunity arose, we sat down as a family and without our kids’ buy-in it was going to be pretty difficult to do,” Cayless told BBC Radio Humberside.
“We get one crack at life, and you want to make sure you have no regrets.
“I’ve been coaching for 12 years now and deliberately taking my time.”
There are some underlying similarities between the two coaches though despite the obvious differences.
Both McNamara and Cayless continuously stressed the importance of “improving” their respective sides as they come in new having been assistants last year.
So, as a slightly more unknown quantity to McNamara, what can Kingston Rovers fans expect from a Cayless side next year?
“What I will promise, we’re going to work really hard throughout pre-season,” Cayless said.
“I promise that the team is going to be ready to start pre-season. They’ll [the players] make their community proud of how they perform.
“These guys that are in the stands, if they’re proud of the performance of the team, the results will look after themselves.”
With three months before the start of the Super League season, there is of course still lots of time for both teams to improve and hit the ground running immediately.
What does seem clear is these old foes have gone in different directions in order to achieve that sought-after improvement.
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