England and British Lions star Andrew Sheridan says it will be payback time in more ways than one when he makes his long-awaited return from injury next month.
The 30-year-old titan of the Sharks front row suffered an horrific shoulder dislocation early last October whilst playing for the Sharks against Cardiff in the Heineken Cup.
The sight of a distraught Sheri wincing in pain as he was gingerly helped off the field was one of the iconic images of last season and its no coincidence that in his absence, Sale Sharks suffered serious agonies of their own as they came within a whisker of relegation.
Now however, after two separate operations to both repair the dislocation on his left shoulder as well as long-standing damage on his right flank, Sheridan is at last ready to return to the fray.
And he admits amongst a desire to make up for lost time and the many other motivating factors driving him on when he returns for Sale's pre-season fixtures, there will be a burning desire to repay the faith the Sharks showed in him during his long, slow road to recovery.
"I only managed to play five games before the injury struck and it didn't come at a good time for the club," the loose-head prop recalled. In some ways, I obviously feel like I owe Sale Sharks a lot so I'd like to have a good season.
"I'm not trying to pretend and start waving the loyalty flag around because it's a professional game and injuries happen." he told the Manchester Evening News.
"But, at the same time, the club has been good and looked after me well and I 'd like to put myself about it this season to try and help Sharks.
"It was very frustrating having to watch from the sidelines and not being able to help last season though, maybe when you haven't played for a while, the temptation is to sit in the stands and think you could do more than you actually could achieve.
"As you get older, you get more honest about your own performances and though when I play I hope I add something to the team, at the same time I don't overestimate what I can bring.
"But looking at it from the club's perspective, hopefully we can emerge stronger from what happened last year. I know it has been talked about a lot but it was major loss the summer before when we lost five or six top quality players and it did have a huge impact on things subsequently.
"Now, its a case of us all trying to get the best out of each other and raising our own personal standards and setting high personal levels that we want to attain.
"If everyone does that on an individual basis then it should combine nicely from a team perspective."
Whilst the England and British Lions star has been striving to return on the field, off it there's been an even bigger, dramatic change in the Sheridan household this summer thanks to the arrival of Andrew and wife Swan’s new baby daughter Catron
And while Sheri revels in the role of playing the doting father, the argument could be made that Sale will be welcoming back a new player themselves when the loose-head colossus finally makes his long awaited return to action.
"In some ways I suppose I do almost feel like a new player having had surgery on both shoulders," Sheridan added.
"I've been out a hell of a long time since last October although in some ways the time seems to have gone very quickly.
"I've got one more appointment with the surgeon Len Funk just to make sure that he's happy and then I'll be looking forward to playing in the pre-season games.
"I will have been out almost 10 months by the time we play our first pre-season game so it has been a long road back but hopefully everything will be alright. Its certainly stronger now.
"Mentally I don’t think it will be a problem. We'll do a lot of contact work in training and try to build things up gradually as I wouldn't go straight into a live scrimmaging scenario.
"We'll probably have some tackling drills first and then build up to scrum work in training and then I'll be ready to go.
"You can't afford to have any worries or anxiety at that first scrum because otherwise the chances of getting reinjured will be even higher.
"If I think about it, I've had generally dodgy shoulders for a while and have managed to get by prior to what happened against Cardiff. My shoulders feel good at the moment and I feel good in myself so I'm looking forward to getting on with it."
