BY ROB

The Raiders loss to the Sharks in round 3 of the NRLW is up there with the all-time Greek tragedies. First came perseverance, then hope, and then finally, despair. In the space of 70 minutes Canberra went from looking like a unit capable of hanging tough with the top of the table (particularly after last week’s close loss to the Knights) to a disjointed outfit incapable of stopping the Sharks from executing the most basic of crash-ball plays.

The first act saw the Raiders and Sharks feeling each other out – the Sharks made metres a lot easier than Canberra, but hobbled themselves with poor discipline in defence (in one instance back-chatting Ref Badger and finding themselves marched up field). With Zahara Temara off for a HIA the Raiders found themselves in the Sharks red zone, and after using some big bodies to draw defenders towards the midfield they executed a swift left side play that found Mackenzie Wiki linking with Maddie Bartlett, who crossed for her first of the game. Shak Tungai nailed an excellent sideline conversion, and the Raiders were on the march.

Canberra were in striking distance just four minutes later, this time opting for a penalty goal after Chante Temara copped a high shot while trying to burrow through some try line defence. The game pattern remained steady – the Sharks would make hay through the middle, clearing 50-60 metres each set, fail to score and then let the Raiders off with a string of penalties. ZT passed her HIA and halftime arrived. The Raiders had persevered, and hope was beginning to shine through.

Canberra started the second half in style, with Bartlett crossing for her second try just 91 seconds after the game had been resumed. This try was facilitated by yet another Mackenzie Wiki line break, and she continues to firm as a key plank of attack in the Raiders framework.

The Sharks continued to hand out penalties like candy in October, but finally their luck turned. Canberra coughed up two successive errors, which in turn lead to a Quincy Dodd line break, which morphed into try for Tiana Penitani. From here it was all downhill for the home team. The Sharks fired up, piled on the metres and then proceeded to pummel Canberra through the middle, setting up shop inside the Raiders ten-metre zone.

I could sit here and list each Sharks try that followed, but that feels like a miserable exercise after a miserable afternoon of footy. The Sharks had kept their powder dry until the time was right, and the Raiders, plagued by unplanned HIAs and the sidelining of Grace Kemp, couldn’t keep them out of their half.

Despair.

It feels a bit mean to apportion blame just three games in, but I genuinely believe that the Raiders forwards have to lift their defensive efforts. Too often the Sharks were allowed to run an easy ten metres plus before meeting contact, and quite often found themselves piling on the post-contact metres with 2-3 Raiders trying to bring them down. The Sharks out-ran the Green Machine by 280 metres, 94 of those being post-contact work. The Sharks completed sets better than Canberra and seemed to have a better grip on how to get to their fifth tackle options – too often the Raiders found themselves just submitting in a tackle on the last, or with a key playmaker taking the tackle when they should have been getting set up to orchestrate the final play.

There were good things to be found in the pain soup – Simaima Taufa ran 170m, and Grace Kemp converted more than half of her 105 run metres into post-contact yardage. Mackenzie Wiki continues to flourish, and Maddie Bartlett remains in the top 3 all-time tryscorers in the NRLW.

Coach Borthwick did his best to plug up the unforseen personnel gaps but it just wasn’t enough, and there will likely have to be some honest discussions about how Canberra can keep their momentum going at the backend of games, particularly when luck begins to turn against them. When the Sharks stopped being their own worst enemies they became the Raiders stuff of nightmares.

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