NEW Luctonians captain Alex Smith says it's an honour to lead the Kingsland side this season.

The outside centre takes over from his brother Dan, who has worn the armband for the past two campaigns.

"It's great honour and nice to follow on from my brother," he said.

"They're huge boots to fill, but I couldn't feel more privileged.

"I just hope I live up to the same expectations and hopefully we can kick on now and take a little bit of pressure off Dan."

Smith is confident Luctonians will do well this season and follow on from their excellent finish to the last campaign, when they finished sixth.

"Our pre-season has been really good this year, our numbers have grown at the right time," explained Smith.

"It's completely different to last year when we we were struggling and never really got there until the end of September.

"This time though, we feel we're ready to hit the ground running and we're really looking forward to the trip to Sheffield [this Saturday].

"We seem to have a stronger squad in depth, which will alleviate the pressure and if we can get those wins on the board early, we will really give it a go.

"I wouldn't want to set targets at this stage, it's a 30 game season so we will take it a game at a time and see where we are at Christmas.

"But if we put ourselves in a really good position, then I can't see why we can't kick on from last season."