BY DAN

There’s bad news and there’s catastrophic. As much as things get in footy, Jamal Fogarty rupturing his bicep is closer to the second. The club is waiting on scans but it likely means he’ll spend at least 12 weeks on the sideline, basically ruling him out for the best part of the season. He may be able to play at the end of the season but depending on what is going on with the club, and his own match fitness, the utility of this will be questionable.

This is a cruel blow for Fogarty. This first quarter of the season has been a masterpiece, a career best. He’d even been mentioned in the Origin conversation. While that’s by the same guy that suggested Aidan Sezer and Blake Austin as a job-lot for NSW at the start of 2016, it speaks to the quality of his game this season. His boot had gone from excellent to a stratosphere as high as his belly-bombs, and only inhabited by the absolute elite of the competition. He’d been directing a young side around the field, ensuring that emerging players were put in positions to succeed. Ethan Strange’s exciting start to his career is heavily influenced by Fogarty’s ability to take on so much of the responsibility that would ensure the young half could focus on the things he was best at.

For the club the impact is immense. Fogarty’s boot had been both a critical part of their attack and defence. There’s a reason that before Saturday night’s game they started their sets in the fourth best position of any team in the comp, and their opponents had started theirs in the second worst (per the Rugby League Eye Test). That’s plenty to do with Fogarty’s ability to turn any set that ended near halfway into a big kick, bad position and a slow start for the opposition. Without him on Saturday they not only struggled to find as effective set ends (though not awful when they did get to the kick) but also to just get to a kick. The team was unequivocally listless and outside of Ethan Strange broadly incapable of organising a cliche in commentary.

Canberra’s solution to this is not surprising. The Canberra Times is reporting that Kaeo Weekes will get first shot at the starting 7 role and is set to start at halfback against the Sharks next weekend. He was pulled from Sunday’s NSW Cup game. He has been the forgotten man of a position-playoff with Ethan Strange in the off-season (turns out a Weekes in a long time yuk yuk yuk). He’s already shown in the trials that he can play alongside Strange, and that between them they can muster an effective and intelligent structure across the side. Sitting at 18th man the last few weeks one could feel him desperate to get a shot. He’s got it now.

This has a flow on effect. This means that centre-cum-second-rower-cum-halfback (the preposition you sickos not the noun. It’s Latin. It’s fancy) Simi Sasagi will get to go back to where he was meant to be because Canberra don’t actually have any choice on that front given they currently have two (2) healthy backrowers in the top 30. He remains an option to play in the halves in the future, but it doesn’t feel like it’s natural for him. Let the man learn his new role I say.

It will naturally mean more responsibility on Strange’s shoulders than is ideal but he’s shown that he’s willing and able to eat whatever is put on his plate. Even in the chaos of the weekend he stood up and was a leader. It’s impressive that he, a near child, was able to keep his head in such a way. As much as possible though it would useful if Weekes can take the role of organiser, replicating as much of Fogarty’s role as possible. There’s only so much he can do in that regard but it would help keep Strange’s job simple(ish). I presume Morgan Smithies will become even more important in his role distributing through the middle third.

It will make for a real weakness on Canberra’s right edge defence. I’m not saying Weekes is a bad defender. Rather Fogarty is a very good one, and even alongside more experienced 12s like Zac Hosking it had been hard work to keep that edge together. Now it will be Sasagi and Weekes inside Matt Timoko. We saw on the weekend what can happen when edge defenders aren’t working together – good systems will make them panic. New combinations don’t help, and given both Sasagi and Weekes (and Mariota when he plays there) will be relatively inexperienced it could be a tough hang.

There are other options of course that might get used in the future. Adam Cook is one, brought home on a trial-and-train contract he’s been excellent as a dominant half in Cup footy. Stylistically I think he may be the best match to Fogarty – he’s more ball dominant and would open up Strange to quietly whittle away. But it’s a big ask for several reasons. He’s played but a mere moment of top line footy (but yo, what a time it was) and I’m not certain he’d be athletically up to it. Weekes has also been 18th man for yonks (that’s such a dope word, use it more), and already established connections with the first grade team from trials. If one was worried about the unknown quality of Weekes and Sasagi together, Cook is taking that and dialling it up to eleven.

It will be worth keeping an eye on how quickly the club can get Ethan Sanders there. This is precisely what Sanders wanted to be at the club for – an opportunity to be a first grade half. He’s young, and more in the Stewart than Strange levels of ready for top line. But he’s a perfect match for both of them, and the future of the club at the position. If the club can get him some top line experience it would hopefully be beneficial (much like Brad Schneider’s time in first grade on Fogarty’s 2022 knee injury was oh wait).

But Weekes is good option. He’s an exciting player in his own right, perhaps not suited to an organising role but certainly capable of doing his share. He can’t kick like Fogarty but neither can anyone else. He’ll add variability and athleticism to the attack, and represents an opportunity to double down on the ‘playing a bit of footy’ front as opposed to ‘slow-and-steady does it’. If we could get more ball play and organisation out of the dummy-half to free up the halves to stay wide and reduce their demands it would also be ideal.

It might not mean they can be the upside of operating model in existence with Fogarty. That’s to be expected. You don’t lose a key player like Fogarty and just skip along happy and content. This will be hard work for the Milk, reducing their ability to win the grind through losing an elite kicking game, removing an important attacking option and reducing their ability to play with width as they incorporate a new half. It’s not good news but the Raiders just have to find a way through.

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