The Mid-Season Report Card: We have reached the halfway point of the season
Brisbane Broncos (D-)
Record: 5-8 (12th)
Assessment: Brisbane’s title defence has been utterly horrific, hampered at first by injuries but now just defined by mediocrity. Reece Walsh is playing with fear and not a lot of respect for his teammate. Ezra Mam has been going so bad he has been dropped. The pack has nearly all been hurt. They have just a single win against a Top 8 team – and have suffered the only loss to the Dragons. Title defences don’t get much worse.
Best Player: Payne Haas – Averaging 160m per game and 31 tackles per game.
Most Improved: Xavier Willison – Behemoth who has shown a big ticker to go with his big frame.
Most Disappointing: Adam Reynolds – Five try assists in 10 games is a very disappointing return for the veteran.
The Future: Va’a Semu – Showing promise as a line-bending forward.
Biggest Strength: Game breaking – There is no consistency but the Broncos have game busters even when down.
Biggest Weakness: Discipline – No team has conceded more penalties.
Season Outlook: Miss Top 8 – With the difficulty of their draw and the injury toll there will be no late-season run to title glory.
Canberra Raiders (D)
Record: 5-8 (13th)
Assessment: The Raiders come off a season where they were one of the luckiest teams in the NRL era on their way to an unlikely minor premiership. Regression has hit hard this year though and the stubborn Ricky Stuart has been late to the party in adapting to the way the game has changed. Switching Ethan Strange from left to right has not worked while Ethan Sanders is not the answer.
Best Player: Kaeo Weekes – Tryscoring has improved as has his workrate, running for 165m a game and most notably, ranking fourth in average tackle breaks.
Most Improved: Simi Sasagi – Has absolutely come from the clouds as a tackle busting machine and major edge threat.
Most Disappointing: Tom Starling – Leads the NRL in missed tackles and offering little in attack with just one try and two assists.
The Future: Ethan Strange – It’s sometimes hard to remember he is just 21 in his second year but his Origin debut showed what a special player he is.
Biggest Strength: Workrate – The Raiders have an incredibly tough pack that runs hard, tackles plenty and rarely gives opponents an easy path to the tryline.
Biggest Weakness: Defence – Ricky Stuart prides himself on defence but the Raiders have conceded 26 or more in nine of 13.
Season Outlook: Miss Top 8 – Got a relatively easy next month, just a single Top 4 opponent and two byes to come but too many deficiencies.
Canterbury Bulldogs (F)
Record: 4-8 (15th)
Assessment: Canterbury, frankly, have been an utter disgrace this season. Given the money spent on the roster, the Bulldogs should be far higher up the table but the persistent tinkering, the utter belligerence, the false deification of the football-manager-cum-delusional-dictator, the continued self-harm, the inability to understand how the game has changed, the poor communication, the misuse of players. After finishing last season in the Top 4, this season has been a complete and utter cluster of the Micheal Luck variety.
Best Player: Jacob Preston – One of the few players who could hold his head up high this season on both sides of the ball.
Most Improved: Enari Tuala – Consistently performs eating metres and finishing off professionally.
Most Disappointing: Connor Tracey – Hard to believe he got a two-year contract extension after proving himself the worst tackling fullback in the NRL to go with his one try assist.
The Future: Jack Underhill – Youngster with a great story who throws everything into it when given an opportunity for the bench.
Biggest Strength: Upside – They showed with their shock win over Penrith they can compete with the big dogs but they are so far off that usually it makes it difficult.
Biggest Weakness: Coaching and Roster Mismanagement – Ciraldo has done so much damage to the team while the club has spent a fortune yet doesn’t have a fullback, a halfback or a hooker of first grade quality, spent a fortune on a big prop as the game moved to mobile middles and has a million utilities, all of whom play no position well.
Season Outlook: Bottom 5 – The team is clearly confused and does not want to play for Ciraldo and Gould won’t fire him so we are at a stalemate.
Cronulla Sharks (C+)
Record: 7-5 (6th)
Assessment: Breaking news: there is nothing new to say about Cronulla. They are the same slightly above average team we have seen every year under Craig Fitzgibbon. They are 4-0 against teams 10th or worse and 2-5 against teams ninth or better. It is more of the same-same above averageness with limited upside that we have seen all year. Strong wins over Manly and New Zealand have given hints but really we know exactly what this team is all about.
Best Player: Braydon Trindall – His 15 try assists in 11 games has elevated him to the elite halves category.
Most Improved: Jesse Colquhoun – Gets through a mountain of work and showed a little bit more with the ball when put into a starting role.
Most Disappointing: Addin Fonua-Blake – Has gone from the game’s best prop to decidedly average with his Origin selection laughable.
The Future: Niwhai Puru – Showed to be more than capable when filling in for Nicho Hynes.
Biggest Strength: Reliability – Cronulla tend to win and win big in games they should do.
Biggest Weakness: Limited Scope For Improvement – Cronulla have long had issues running with the best teams in the competition and after doing nothing to their roster are unsurprisingly in the same position.
Season Outlook: Top 8 – Even draw on the way in and a senior roster should be enough to take them to the finals again though once more they aren’t good enough to get to a decider.
The Dolphins (B+)
Record: 7-5 (5th)
Assessment: The Dolphins once again started the season slowly with a disappointing opening – but four of those five losses came to teams currently in the Top 8 and included close losses to the two standouts of the premiership. Since they have put together five wins on end, scored more than 28 in each and conceded 14 or fewer in four of five. This team is legitimately good across the park with the only real weakness being the halves pairing.
Best Player: Herbie Farnworth – Herbie incredibly leads the NRL in both tackle breaks and offloads while running for 167m per game and scoring in every second game.
Most Improved: Selwyn Cobbo – The move to the Dolphins has done wonders for Cobbo, scoring eight tries in 11 games and earning a rep recall.
Most Disappointing: Morgan Knowles – Came to the NRL with huge wraps but despite a big motor has struggled with the pace.
The Future: Jack Bostock – His return off an ACL out of position has been unprecedented and he will be the centrepiece of the Dolphins backline soon.
Biggest Strength: Defence – The Dolphins are regarded as a flashy side but they have conceded 14 or fewer six times this season and more than 26 just twice.
Biggest Weakness: Isaiya Katoa – Katoa is serviceable but the role he is given does not match his abilities and his failure to record a try assist in the last three games is a worry.
Season Outlook: Top 4 – The Dolphins have added a stout defence to a flamboyant attack and can absolutely go as far as the Grand Final.
Luke Keary Is A Once-In-A-Generation Analyst: It is incredibly rare that television analysts in any sport give an honest view of the sport they are covering and is as rare as an edible sandwich at Subway when the analyst is fresh off playing. So we should be absolutely treasuring the work of Luke Keary, who has been utterly ruthless in some of his assessments. He utterly decimated Valentine Holmes and his substandard form early in the season and on Sunday totally castrated both Jarome Luai and Sunia Turuva, lambasting them for what has claimed to be achieved at the Tigers by them both and what has actually been achieved. It was as scything as it was honest. When we are normally given something between guff and the self-interested, verbal diarrhoea we get on a certain magazine program, it is sweet relief to get someone offering an honest opinion without fear of offending someone he played with or against or driving an agenda based on what team he owns or who he manages or who he is mates with.
Everybody Hates Raymond: Wyatt Raymond’s position in The Bunker needs to be permanently revoked after the laziest decision in the history of the sordid Sanctuary of Morons. He had surprisingly nailed a decision just minutes earlier when disallowing an Ed Kosi try that had been awarded with the ball clearly first grounded on the sideline for anyone who knows how to identify a shadow and view a side-on camera. That goodwill ended on the ensuing set when Manly scored a try off a clear Ben Trbojevic knock on that simply wasn’t looked at out of laziness. Raymond – and the many others in the Bunker around him and there are many – just didn’t look at the play-the-ball. The Bunker exists purely to avoid howlers yet the NRL continually gives a pass to those who allow them. On-field referees can be afforded some leeway for human error. The Bunker cannot. Howlers should not exist. It is time to eliminate all the officiating management and totally overhaul the personnel in The Bunker, totally eliminating anyone involved now.
The Willie M Team of the Week: This week’s team of strugglers and stragglers:
1.Scott Drinkwater (NQ)[Text Wrapping Break]2.Mat Feagai (Dra)[Text Wrapping Break]3.Sunia Turuva (Tig)[Text Wrapping Break]4.Bronson Xerri (Bul)[Text Wrapping Break]5.Faaletino Tavana (Tig)[Text Wrapping Break]6.Jarome Luai (Tig)[Text Wrapping Break]7.Ethan Sanders (Can)[Text Wrapping Break]8.Jacob Saifiti (New)[Text Wrapping Break]9.Tom Starling (Can)[Text Wrapping Break]10.Fonua Pole (Tig)[Text Wrapping Break]11.Mavrik Geyer (Tig)[Text Wrapping Break]12.Jack Gosiewski (Bri)[Text Wrapping Break]13.Reuben Cotter (NQ)[Text Wrapping Break]——————————————[Text Wrapping Break]14.Tallyn Da Silva (Par)[Text Wrapping Break]15.Soni Luke (NQ)[Text Wrapping Break]16.Josh Kerr (Dra)[Text Wrapping Break]17.Morgan Smithies (Can)[Text Wrapping Break]——————————————[Text Wrapping Break]Coach: Benji Marshall (Tig)
Referee Gradings: This week’s gradings:
Adam Gee (D+)
Ashley Klein (C+)
Gerard Sutton (C)
Wyatt Raymond (C-)
Jarrod Cole (B-)
Grant Atkins (B)
Liam Kennedy (C-) – full respect to Liam Kennedy’s belligerence, now barely blowing a penalty or set restart after being dumped for awarding nearly 30 in a game.
Todd Smith (B-)
The 2026 Field Goal Update – 12: Adam Reynolds became the first player this season to kick two field goals in a season when slotting a field goal to put Brisbane ahead, a lead they ultimately could not keep in a 28-23 loss.
Fun Fact #1: There have been just four 28-23 scorelines in premiership history with the Titans-Broncos just the second instance since 1974.
Fun Fact #2: Two matches in UK senior professional Rugby League history have finished 1-1: a 1980 Championship match between Workington and Hull KR and a 1982 Premiership Trophy match between Leigh and Warrington.
Fun Fact #3: Two games have finished 84-1 – and York finished with a field goal on each occasion. Both games were this century.
Rumour Mill: Wests Tigers are remarkably set to make a play for former Manly hooker turned jailbird Manase Fainu, the brother of Samuela, Sione and Latu. Gold Coast have pulled out of signing Jesse Arthars less than 48 hours after playing and exposing the winger. Tyrell Sloan will almost certainly depart St George Illawarra with Super League the most likely destination though the Cowboys are not out of the running.
The Coaching Crosshairs: The pressure is mounting on Broncos coach Michael Maguire after a diabolical title defence should see the club miss the finals, following a very similar pattern his time at South Sydney, where they fell off a cliff very quickly primarily due to not wanting to climb the mountain again under the rigorous conditions Maguire imposes. If Maguire – and clubs – have any self-awareness they will realise he is a short-term coach who should sign two-year deals with clubs close to winning and get them over the top before moving on to another mercenary job. Cronulla should be calling now.
Moronic Coaching Decision of the Week: Dean Young persisting with Clint Gutherson, Valentine Holmes and Dan Atkinson. We all know Young wants to win the job but he has to do something for the Dragons future and part of that should be sticking with Tyrell Sloan, giving young Dragons outside backs an opportunity and allowing them a chance by bringing in a No.6 that can actually kick the ball.
Watch It: With the World Cup of another sport kicking off this week, we go back to 1968 to watch the key clash between Great Britain and France on a muddy Carlaw Park in Auckland. The game gets off to a flyer with a short kick not travelling 10m before an attempt at penalty goal from halfway travels about 35m. Watch this mud-caked classic here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpXFP-TzTZQ