Mitch Moses believes Jonah Pezet’s Parramatta sojourn will bring him a new-found freedom at No.7, ready to share on-ball duties with the Eels’ short-term five-eighth.
Pezet will play his first game in Eels colours in a pre-season trial against Cronulla on Sunday, with Moses sitting out the match and Joash Papalii playing No.7.
The 23-year-old’s highly publicised one-year stint with the Eels is a bridging deal for both he and Parramatta, with Papalii the likely No.6 when Pezet moves to Brisbane in 2027.
Moses has spent the past seven seasons partnering Dylan Brown, who was mainly a running half at No.6.
Moses will always remain the Eels’s dominant controlling playmaker, but in Pezet the Eels captain believes he has a natural organiser ready to share attacking duties.
Pezet also offers Parramatta another legitimate in-play kicking option, after no halves partner kicked more than four times with Moses in the team last year.
“He’s definitely going to free me up a fair bit,” Moses told AAP.
“He plays really square on the footy. So we’ll look to change our roles. He’ll play on the ball, sometimes I’ll play on the ball.
“We’ll play both sides of the ruck. We’re going to do all those types of things.
“He’s got a great kick in him as well. So I feel like we’re threats across the whole park with our kicking game.
“So I feel like it brings a bit of a different element to our footy from last year.”
Moses is the first to admit the past two years had been the most frustrating of his career, with foot, bicep and calf injuries restricting him to 19 NRL games.
When on the field he has been one of the NRL’s best, but the Eels’ 7-20 record without the NSW State of Origin playmaker has told the story of 2024 and 2025.
“When I hit 200 games, I’d missed five or six games. And then I just hit a hole,” Moses said.
“It’s been upsetting because I feel when I was finally finding my groove and then another injury, bang. And then you start back again.
“It was hard watching from the sidelines, especially with how the boys were going last year at the start of the year with a new coach and new systems.
“I just hope I’m past those things.”
The Eels are tipped to be one of the NRL’s biggest improvers in their second season under Jason Ryles.
After losing their first four games last year amid a structural and personnel overhaul, the Eels finished 2025 with four wins from the final five rounds.
“It’s not going to be as easy as that though,” Moses warned.
“The season’s not going to start off the exact same as how we finished. I would love it to. But it’s just not the reality.
“The footy’s played a lot different at the start of the year than what it is towards the end of the year.
“We’ve got to have a real big focus on how we start. We haven’t done that well the past few years.”
