http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/believer-ayshford-commits-to-tigers-20110518-1et5i.html
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Believer Ayshford commits to Tigers
Glenn Jackson
May 19, 2011
ON EACH of the folders that Wests Tigers players carry with them this year are the words: Believe. Commit. Prepare. Win.
Blake Ayshford managed two of them within hours yesterday, declaring his belief that his side would win the premiership after securing his future with the club for the next four seasons.
The Tigers yesterday extended the centre's contract until the end of 2015\. Refreshingly, the 23-year-old, who had been contracted until the end of next year, said he was not interested in testing his worth on the open market, preferring to commit to his teammates.
''I didn't really want to go anywhere else, so I was happy to see what they had to offer,'' Ayshford said. ''I'm not one of the elite centres, where I'd get a lot of money somewhere else. Playing with my mates, I'm happy to play for any amount of money.
''I've been here since I was 18\. I've been training with the full-time boys since then. In our team we call each other brothers. We're pretty tight. It feels good to stay here and keep that bond going. It'd be hard to start at a new club and do it all over again.''
He also said the decision by coach Tim Sheens, who was courted by the team's opponents this Saturday night, Penrith, to commit to the club made his choice easier.
''I'm having fun here,'' he said. ''I think we've got a good team and I'm pretty sure we've got the team that can win the comp. There's no reason for me to leave.''
While the Tigers have been inconsistent so far this year, Ayshford said he firmly believed the club could win this year's premiership. Knowing the four words on the front of his and his teammates' game notes, the 100kg centre will settle for nothing less.
''If we do all those things, we know we can win,'' the Junior Kangaroo said. ''We've just got to do everything to win. That was our goal at the start of the year. There was nothing else we needed to talk about, just win, and be sore losers if we did lose. If we lose, we're filthy that we lost that game. It doesn't matter how well we've played. We need to play better to win. Belief's a big thing in the club. Coach is really trying to push that - 'if you don't believe you're going to win it, you're not going to'. We believe it.
''We know we can play footy. It's not hard to fix what we're doing.
''That's still the goal. I don't think we can settle for anything less. We fell one short last year by two points, and we don't want to feel like that again. That's still burning.''
The Tigers face the Panthers following one of their most disappointing performances of the season, a 29-18 defeat by South Sydney. Ayshford described the loss as a wake-up call. ''I think we went too easy into the game,'' he conceded.
''We didn't respect them enough. We've got two hard tests - Penrith have bounced back and then we've got the defending premiers [St George Illawarra]. One or two wins, and we can be up to fourth, and a loss could take us back down to the bottom three.''
