Whitehaven RL have announced that they will be extending two players' contracts. 

Jake Bradley and Dion Aiye will have their contracts extended for a longer period than expected. 

Jake is the club's youngest ever player, aged just 16 when he started - he also became the youngest ever try scorer that afternoon. 

His new deal will take him to the end of the 2023 season. 

He has become a regular on the team and has progressed well into the position of forward. 

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Head coach Jonty Gorley said: "It's good to get Jake sorted out for next season. Jake is a young local kid who wants to play for Whitehaven, which in itself is refreshing. We forget he's still only 21.

"Jake is a great kid to coach he is very enthusiastic and does all the right things, he is very vocal and knows his job as a middle unit player. He is only going to get better, as we've seen, with the more games he plays."

Club director Ashley Kilpatrick added: "It’s great to have secured Jake for another year I think towards the back end of 2021 Jake started to show what he can do for us and how big of a player for Whitehaven he can be."

Dion Aiye has just signed a three-year deal that will take him until the end of the 2025 season. 

This will mean that Aiye, orginally from Papua New Guinea, will have played for the club for ten years at that point. 

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Said Gorley: "To get Dion signed up for the next three seasons is a massive boost for us, we need players of Dion's calibre if we are to try to keep on improving.

"Everyone sees every week what Dion brings to the team, we are 100% a better team when he is on the pitch. His carries are strong and defensively there's no-one better on his day, he is a bit of an "xfactor" for us and teams are wary when he plays.

"As a coach he is great to have there are no negatives with him even though he's not as young as he was, he is still one of the fittest and best trainers we have. He just goes out and does a job every time he trains and plays."