Brown believes if any side is capable of engaging the support of a regional centre, it is the Novocastrians, adding he’ll be encouraging his team - one that will boast State of Origin guns Trent Hodkinson and Dane Gagai - to embrace the Orange community.

“I think Newcastle, being the club it is and having a lot of young local players that are country people, I think they know the importance of what an NRL team can bring to a country town,” Brown said.

“When you go to a regional area, you hope you win the hearts and minds of all the country people.

“Even if they don’t decide to follow the Knights, or they follow another team already, we want them to leave feeling that both sides put in a decent contest and, more importantly, the players are down to earth and contribute to the young kids, whether it be through autographs or socially talking to people around town in the lead-up to the game.”

Brown’s Knights will tackle Canberra next February in the first top flight rugby league game at Wade Park since City-Country in 2009, ending a six-year absence of NRL in Orange.

That drought alone should ensure the starved, footy-loving public of Orange embrace the Knights, but if that was not enough, Brown revealed the likes of Hodkinson and Gagai, as well as excitement machines Aku Uate, Jarrod Mullen and Jake Mamo were set to light up Wade Park.

“Anyone who is fit and in contention for round one will be playing,” the returning coach said.

He said a number of new combinations would be on show as well.

“Trent Hodkinson, for example, won’t have training until the start of February with the team, so we’ll have some different combinations and different ages of people playing,” he added.

“It’s not necessarily about winning the game, but we’d like to put in a performance we can build on.” 

As much as it is about embracing the bush, Brown said the trial game, which will be his side’s first as a full squad for 2016, was about putting what was a lacklustre campaign last winter - netting eight wins and a wooden spoon - behind them.

“It will be our first hit out as a team, as it will be for Canberra,” Brown said.

“Canberra is a team many will be tipping to play finals for the first time, (and) we are a club starting out off the back of a year that probably wasn’t so good. 

“There are a lot of older players gone and we are a team that’s going to be providing opportunity for some talented younger players so we will be one of the more unknown teams.

“[It’s]an exciting time for all the players.”

Brown’s Knights take on the Raiders on Saturday, February 20.

Tickets are available through Ticketek.