Good Shopping, Bad Shopping: We are halfway through the season and fortunes have been decided by offseason buys, both good and bad.
Here are the 10 of the best and the 10 worst of 2025.
Best
1.Erin Clark (NZ) – Clark is one of the most underrated players in the NRL with tremendous leg speed, is a key momentum winner and is certainly value for money.
2.Terrell May (Tig) – May has been arguably the best prop in the competition this year, giving the Tigers plenty to work with as he puts in huge minutes and massive output.
3.Isaiah Iongi (Par) – Revelation as a livewire Eels fullback after the club took a huge risk moving Clint Gutherson on.
4.Savelio Tamale (Can) – Stunning to think he could not get a game for the Dragons considering his workrate at the Raiders.
5.James Fisher-Harris (NZ) – No import has offered more with their intangibles than Fisher-Harris, whose leadership with the Warriors has been immense.
6.Matty Nicholson (Can) – Little-known UK import who not only gets through a mountain of work, but is an excellent tryscoring threat.
7.Zac Lomax (Par) – Started slowly when being used in the centres but back on the wing he has been an elite player.
8.Addin Fonua-Blake (Cro) – Continues to put up huge numbers though slides down with his old team up and his new team down on last year.
9.Jack Williams (Par) – Been a revelation for the Eels playing huge minutes, turning into a dynamic runner with a huge workrate.
10.Jamie Humphreys (Sou) – Underrated halfback who is more than a contributor.
Worst
1.Lachlan Ilias (Dra) – Lasted until Round 8 and now can’t get past Kyle Flanagan.
2.Lewis Dodd (Sou) – Big-name recruit seemingly now sixth in line as a Bunnies half.
3.Jayden Sullivan (Sou) – Glorified speed bump who ranks fifth in missed tackles.
4.Chad Townsend (Roo) – Backup half who is now NSW Cup cheerleader.
5.Jack Bird (Tig) – King of bonehead plays who spits the bit more than any player in the NRL.
6.Marcelo Montoya (Bul) – Winger without speed who doesn’t seem to know where the touch line is.
7.Valentine Holmes (Dra) – Maybe the highest paid centre in the comp has four tries to go with a top 10 number in errors.
8.Reagan Campbell-Gillard (GC) – Broken 100m four times this year with just five offloads and nine tackle breaks – offering nothing.
9.Jaxson Paulo (NQ) – Can’t get a run on a very ordinary Cowboys team while he has a penchant for poorly-timed errors.
10.Jarome Luai (Tig) – Huge-money recruit that has zero tries and five try assists for a team that has barely jumped from last.
It’s Time To Bring In A Cup: Arguably the biggest game in English Rugby League is the Challenge Cup final.
The FA Cup is a massive deal in English soccer as cup competitions are in most soccer competitions and the NBA has recently added one.
Once again we have great consternation of how to structure Origin with most in agreement that the undermining of the premiership is the worst aspect.
That can be easily solved – by running a knockout cup competition.
The benefits are plentiful, we get a huge opportunity for clubs to win another trophy, teams can approach it to what best suits their needs – title contenders are unlikely to go hard while coaches under pressure will be all in.
It provides plenty of content while not undermining the integrity of the premiership, qualifiers can start in the preseason.
Three weeks can occur in the three weeks before the three Origins and a week in late-July can be put aside for the final.
Sad Days For Radley But Hard To See How He Can Go On: Victor Radley has been one of the great warriors of the modern-day NRL, a fierce defender and fearless ball-runner who has never taken a backward step, an absolute delight to watch.
He has endured a never-ending run of concussions over the last few seasons though and it is hard to see how the Roosters or NRL can allow him to play on.
Hopefully a long spell will see him return at some point but there must be grave fears for his future.
Turpin Turdin: Jake Turpin’s 18-minute performance against South Sydney was perhaps the dumbest performance of the season and exactly the reason he plies his trade in reserve grade.
Nearly single-handedly Turpin invited Souths back into the contest with an utterly moronic display that saw him concede three penalties and get sent to the sin bin.
He should never wear the blue and white at NRL level again.
Rugby League’s First Knight: The Greatest Game of All finally received some recognition over the weekend when the great Wigan flyer Billy Boston became Rugby League’s first ever knight.
Boston was the game’s preeminent start in the 1950s and ‘60s in the UK with the Welsh star scoring a remarkable 483 tries in 499 club games along with 83 tries in 61 games representing Great Britain in both Tests and tour games.
There is no player more deserving.
The Bunker Costs The Knights Victory: Adam O’Brien had every right to blow up after the Knights had any chance of victory stolen from them by an egregious Bunker decision.
Adam Gee may well be one of the better on-field officials but his Bunker work has been appalling of late and just further highlights the need for the NRL to separate on-field officials and Bunker officials – and that does not mean putting in the worst on-field officials into The Bunker as is currently the policy it seems, with the number of games Butler and Badger get.
By persisting with on-field officials, the pool of potential talent is reduced from the entire adult population to about 15 people.
Given the number of abject failures we have seen, the NRL cannot afford this, hire some out of shape people, old people, slow people … they can all do a job in The Bunker and it is hard to believe they could be worse than what we see right now.
The Willie M Team of the Week: This week’s team of failures and f-ups:
1.Tom Trbojevic (Man)
2.Tyrell Sloan (Dra)
3.Moses Suli (Dra)
4.Reuben Garrick (Man)
5.Murray Taulagi (NQ)
6.Jaxon Purdue (NQ)
7.Jake Clifford (NQ)
8.Emre Guler (Dra)
9.Lachlan Croker (Man)
10.Siosiua Taukeiaho (Man)
11.Sam McIntyre (NQ)
12.Ben Trbojevic (Man)
13.Jake Trbojevic (Man)
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14.Jake Turpin (Bul)
15.Harrison Edwards (NQ)
16.Corey Waddell (Man)
17.Jermaine McEwen (New)
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2025 Field Goal Update – 7: Another week without field goals in one of the biggest disgraces of a season for one-pointers in modern history.
Fun Fact #1: Jordan McLean became the first player in the NRL era to play with both a father and son, playing with Tom Learoyd-Lahrs in Round 2 of 2015 for the Melbourne Storm before playing in Kaiden Lahrs debut against the Dolphins on Saturday night.
Fun Fact #2: There have been six father-son duos coach in the NRL: Alan and Craig Fitzgibbon, Don and David Furmer, Sandy and Joe Pearce, John and Stuart Raper, Craig and Dean Young and Ken and Peter Gentle.
Fun Fact #3: Ricky Stuart’s son Jed Stuart is set to debut for the Raiders this week, making him the third son of an active NRL coach to be selected in first grade by his father.
All-Time Betting Moment: Herbie Farnworth was one of the most bet-on anytime tryscorer bets over the weekend.
He had a ripping game in the rout of the Cowboys but failed to score until Kodi Nikorima made a break and passed Farnworth the ball over the line, not only continuing Farnworth’s tryscoring streak that was extended to eight but filling up for all punters who loaded up on him.
There will not be a better break all year.
Former Knight Sam Stone has left Super League flabbergasted after he refused to play for Salford this week, potentially leading to a black ball from Super League clubs though it is believed Warrington had already agreed to sign him.
Rumour Mill: Selwyn Cobbo is set to move to Sydney with the Sydney Roosters favoured to win his signature though St George Illawarra are not without a shot.
Reed Mahoney will almost certainly be the starting hooker for the Cowboys in 2026.
Moronic Coaching Decision of the Week: Billy Slater made some astonishing selection calls when naming his team for Origin II including dropping skipper Daly Cherry-Evans but none matched what he decided to do with his backrow.
In one fell swoop Slater dumped his two best players from Game 1 in Patrick Carrigan and Jeremiah Nanai to the bench, sticking with middle Reuben Cotter on an edge, recalling missed tackle machine Kurt Capewell to start, leaving out Beau Fermor from the squad and starting plodder Trent Loiero.
It was complete madness.
The Coaching Crosshairs: The drums are beating for Anthony Seibold with the Manly coach essentially receiving a “full support of the board” message over the weekend with News Corp reporting Manly insiders saying he is “safe for now”.
That is absolutely the beginning of the end game with the soil now being tilled to rissole Seibold with CEO Tony Mestrov likely to join him.
Seibold seemed to be the only person in the country who thought Seibold was not poison when he hired him at Manly, seemingly at the behest of Isaac Moses, before Mestrov then negotiated against himself when extending him last year.
Seibold has had one winning season in his five since leaving Souths after a year.
His teams have dramatically underachieved primarily thanks to an inability to play bad teams well, a failure to get an attack that should be the best in the NRL playing consistently well, a very poor record away from Brookvale and some inane roster management that has built one of the worst packs in the NRL.
Seibold portrays himself as an intellectual coach but he really has not only failed to innovate at all but failed to cover up some very basic problems at the club.
Michael Ennis is being groomed as his successor but the club should be looking at Willie Peters to bring a much-needed hard edge to the club.
Watch It: Perhaps the greatest field goal kicked in premiership history came in 1996 when Andrew Willis belted one from just under 50 metres to give Western Suburbs a 23-22 win over North Sydney at Campbelltown that helped push the Magpies to their last ever finals campaign.
It was an amazing strike in an era that such long drop goals were not common. Watch it here.