A new year has arrived, and NRL clubs will be back from their Christmas breaks to ramp up pre-season training in the next week.

The final run to the season often brings with it heightened intensity and discussion as fans ready themselves for the new campaign.

This year could on another level altogether with the season opening in Las Vegas a week ahead of schedule.

Expectations are a funny thing though. Every year, there are teams who will go well beyond what they were expected to do, and others who fall a long way short of where they were supposed to be.

But what exactly are those expectations for all 17 NRL teams in 2024?

Here is what your team needs to do to earn a pass in 2024.

7. Eels: Preliminary finals

Parramatta were one of the real disappointments of the 2023 campaign, going from grand finalists the season before, to missing the top eight altogether.

Brad Arthur enters 2024 as a man under pressure - of that there can be no doubt. For years now he has had a roster that, by and large, has underperformed where it really should be.

Apart from the grand final in 2022, the Eels haven't come close to winning a competition, and you could argue that even in that campaign, they were still a long way short of the Panthers who took out the premiership.

While there is little doubt another failure to play finals football would leave plenty of doubt over the future of Arthur, in actuality, anything short of the preliminary finals is going to be viewed as an abject failure for the blue and gold who have a roster suited to high-intensity, high-end rugby league.