At the launch yesterday of the 25th Charity Shield, the two inaugural captains reminisced about how violent the clash was. But while the fistic fury of yesteryear has been lost in the annual contest, the importance that the two sides place on it has not been.

Fighting has been replaced by fighting words.

Jason Taylor and Nathan Brown, the respective coaches of South Sydney and St George Illawarra, both agree that the game, to be played this Saturday night at the Olympic Stadium at Homebush Bay, will be as physical as a premiership game - and almost as important.

With both sides trialling new players as well as new playing styles, and with a number of positions still up for grabs, the stakes have been raised significantly.

"There's a fair few positions up for grabs … there's a fair few blokes there that will be treating it as their first game," Brown said. "They know if they don't perform against JT's mob on Saturday they won't get to play in the opening game against the Tigers."

For Brown's Dragons, Mark Gasnier will play despite suffering a ruptured bicep in the corresponding game last year. And according to Brown, "he's not going to be taking it soft".

Dean Young will return after playing just three games last season due to knee troubles.

For Taylor's Rabbitohs, Craig Wing will return - part of a significant style alteration from Taylor, who will play left and right halves this season - after playing no games with the club since 1999.

"There's a lot on the line for the players," Taylor said.

"We'll be ready to play like it's the first game, particularly for the first period, because we want to be ready to go when round one comes around.

"It's great to have a game where we know the intensity's going to be like it is in round one. In the other trial games you can do some things and think that was OK but you don't really know because things are going to go up a few levels come round one. This game's a lot closer."

It almost always is. Yesterday, as the two sides named near full-strength line-ups for the game, Craig Young and Ken Stewart were there to hear them, as captains in the first Charity Shield in 1982.

That game was won 9-7 by the Dragons, continuing a tradition of tight and tough contests.

"It was to raise funds for the hospital, which was pretty important, but because of the intensity of the game, some of the players went off to the hospital the next day," Young said.

"The Charity Shield was never a trial, it was a contest that's evolved. I remember turning up there to the game, as soon as you walked into the ground, you had a feeling that something was going to happen, and with the personalities in the team, it certainly did."

Stewart said: "After five minutes we knew it wasn't a trial - everyone had to watch their own back," Stewart recalled. "At the end of the game, everybody was pretty bruised. The next year you knew what to expect and any new guys coming to the club, we said, 'Just look after yourself because no one else can look after you because things will happen in the game that don't normally happen in trials'.

"[Nowadays] they've probably got 20 or 30 TV cameras following them around the paddock where in 1982 we had nothing, all you had to worry about was Albert [Young] chasing you around the paddock."

Brown said his first Charity Shield experience was as a spectator after he was brought to the club - watching from the sidelines with Gorden Tallis and Matt Parsons.

"Souths had signed Eion Crossan, and Souths kicked off to St George, anyway St George played their four or five tackles and kicked it down, and Dave Barnhill hit Eion Crossan and basically knocked him out cold, busted his nose," he said. "I thought, 'Shit, I thought this was a trial match."