BY ROB

Last round the Raiders notched another win, edging out a muddled Roosters outfit to record their first victory at the new Allianz stadium. This week they return home to face a Titans side seemingly buoyed by a change in circumstances.

Canberra have made a habit of winning excruciatingly tight contests this year, usually by way of being not as bad as the opposing team. They’re yet to record an outright thumping in 2023 (well as victors) and this doesn’t seem like a thing likely to change soon.

The Raiders currently have aerial assaults as their dominant form of attack. Fogarty terrorised the Roosters back 3 with kicks, each one seemingly harder to defuse. Given that the Raiders currently struggle with structured attack, kicking may be their best option against a Titans defence which proved to be moderately resolute against the Broncos.

The real test for the Milk here is match stamina. Due to Sticky’s unrelenting obsession with less than optimal bench selections the Raiders will once again find themselves with only two genuine middles to rotate at prop or second row, meaning they will once again be subject to second half fatigue earlier than their opponents.

Defensively they need to shut down the Titans left edge. Foran is lethal when paired with Fifita, demonstrated by the short ball try they deployed against Brisbane. This combo has the added effect of sucking in edge defenders, leaving winger Khan- Pereira huge amounts of space out wide. The Raiders edge will need to have confidence in their inside defenders to avoid this trap.

Team list thoughts

The big stinger is the absence of Papa (hamstring). His spot is Saulo’s for the time being, partnering Tapine at prop with Horse at lock. Saulo’s bench spot is claimed by Mariota. Canberra’s forward supplies are tight and they need the current healthy ones to get through this unscathed.

The bench is again causing me stress, and I’d like to see Hola brought in with Cotric dropping back to Cup to work on effort and skills.

The Titans remain unchanged after their win last week.

Match-ups

Joseph Tapine vs Tino Fa’asuamaleaui. Even though they’re on opposing sides of the ruck the idea of these two making contact is quite the thing. Both are hard to bring down and both need their ball carrying arm restrained before a timely offload occurs.

Predictions

I know every week we dream of a Raiders win (hopefully by 56!) but it seems as though the Green Machine is determined to do things the hard way this year. This means they’re almost always perilously close to a loss, even if they’ve scratched out an 18 point lead. I think they can get the job done again this week, but it will almost certainly be a nail-biter.

Raiders by 6!

You can follow Rob on Twitter here. Or you can do us a solid and like our page on Facebook, or share this on social media. Don’t hesitate to send us feedback (dan@sportress.org) or comment below if you think we are stupid. Or if we’re not.