Kai O’Donnell Returns to Leigh Leopards for 2027 After Two Seasons at the North Queensland Cowboys
Kai O’Donnell is going back to Leigh. The Leopards confirmed on Friday that the 27-year-old second-rower will rejoin them for the 2027 Super League season, after two years with the North Queensland Cowboys in the NRL.
He leaves Townsville for the club where he made his name, and where, he says, his daughter was born.
What he did at Leigh the first time
O’Donnell arrived at Leigh in 2022 with four NRL games behind him, all for Canberra in 2020. He had never held down a first-grade spot in Australia.
Under Adrian Lam he scored 31 tries in 77 games over three years. He won the Championship with Leigh in 2022 and was in the side that ended the club’s 52-year wait for the Challenge Cup at Wembley in 2023, the BBC reported. Love Rugby League rated him one of Super League’s best back-rowers by the time he left.
That form earned him a second go in the NRL. He went back to Australia in 2025 and played 25 first-grade games for the Cowboys over two seasons, according to Love Rugby League.
A deal that nearly happened a season early
Leigh tried to bring him back before the 2026 deadline. Love Rugby League reported that the deal was close but broke down late on, and Lam’s side then went out in their first play-off game, away to eventual champions Wakefield Trinity.
O’Donnell is Leigh’s third signing for 2027, after hooker Jack Purtill and prop Tevita Pangai Jr.
What O’Donnell said
“I made no secret of the fact that it was a really difficult decision to leave. I love the club, the fans and the town,” he told the club. “When the opportunity came to rejoin, I jumped at the chance and I can’t wait to get back home.”
He credited Lam with most of his development. “Lammy is a coach I have the utmost respect and admiration for. He’s really developed me as a player, and I think my time in the past under him has brought out my best football.”
And he has noticed how much Leigh have changed while he was away. “Last time I joined Leigh, they were a Championship club. This time, they’re Super League play-off regulars, and hopefully we can turn that into silverware at the end of the season.”
Owen Trout goes the other way
The signing lands a day after another Leigh forward was in the news. Owen Trout, who won his only England cap against Australia last year, is joining the Cronulla Sharks this off-season.
On Thursday the BBC reported that Trout had served a one-month ban earlier this year after testing positive for cannabis following a Super League match against Wakefield on 20 March. He admitted the charge, and the ban ran from 22 May to 21 June.
So Leigh lose one back-row forward to the NRL and get another one back from it. O’Donnell also knows the Las Vegas stage: he played there with the Cowboys this year, and Love Rugby League expects Leigh to play in Vegas in 2027.
England’s men are already out of the World Cup, knocked out when Tonga beat Samoa, and the semi-finals are this weekend. Our World Cup guide in UK time has every kick-off.
