BY DAN

Hello and welcome to our offseason series. In this we’ll take a look at what is likely to be another challenging year. Sometimes it won’t be fun but occasionally it will, because life sucks and we deserve a little peace and a promise of sunshine. This is part two. You can find part one on Ethan Strange here.

The search for depth in the backrow has been a problem in search of a solution for years now.

Before the Raiders signed Zac Hosking last season the plan was Hudson Young and hope that Elliott Whitehead could drag his old bones around the field for another year. Simi Sasagi was signed and turned into a backrower just because the Raiders had no other options. When Hosking went down in round six, Whitehead emerged from his rest like the Undertaker, pulled together another effective year while we all marvelled at the luck of it. The other options were middles playing on the edge, centres playing at backrow, dogs and cats living together. You know, mass hysteria.

Despite Whitehead walking off into the sunset, Canberra enter 2025 with rare known depth at the position. Hudson Young has established himself as one of the best backrowers in the competition, and really seemed to be finding something brilliant in his ball-running at the end of the season. Zac Hosking is back and presumably health and ready to take on the full time role on the right edge. He was leading the Dally M voting early in the 2024 season, such was his impact on the Raiders. In addition new recruit Matty Nicholson wasn’t signed to be eye candy.

Even in the second tier of talent the word is nothing but good. NSW Cup Coach Brock Shepperd has been nothing but complimentary of the progress Simi Sasagi has made since he joined the club. We saw that progress between his first forays in first grade at the beginning of the year and those at the end. For a man that has only been playing the position for a hot minute his development has been impressive. In his initial first grade games he understandably found the defensive task onerous. By the end of the year he was a key part of some of most astounding defensive efforts in recent Raiders history.

Similarly beyond Sasagi, Shepperd was obviously impressed with the quick progress Noah Martin has made in moving through the grades this year.

Noah played the first three or four weeks in Flegg…by the end of the year mate he was awesome… he is such a calm, humble, quiet, diligent, like just student of the game… I know he’ll certainly be in the mix (for first grade)…You just know he’s going to work his backside off and put himself in the picture.

Joey Taps reiterated this message on the Bloke in the Bar podcast, noting him as a talent of the future. I’ve mentioned before that I’ve tended to see Martin a more of a middle, but I’m not a coach, and he’s played all his recent footy on the edge. He runs hard lines and will put a hurt on you in defence. Whether he has the agility and quick-witted decision-making necessary to defend at backrow in first grade is yet to be seen. As Shepperd said in that same discussion, Cup is not NRL. Sasagi displayed how much value can be taken from learning lessons in first grade to fix in reggies. We won’t know where Noah is best set until he gets that opportunity in the top line.

But that puts the number of potential backrowers at five, which is far more than we’ve had in the pot for a while. Smart people will tell you when there’s lots of options then you have no good ones. That doesn’t apply here. Right now the Raiders have a star, two clear starters, three people pushing for spots, and even people like Ata Mariota and Corey Horsburgh that can fill the position in a pinch. It’s just sad that Corey Harawira-Naera won’t be able to contribute.

All in all it means Canberra not only have top level talent in a problem position, but they also have a pipeline of talent to press over the coming years. They have flexibility in their use of those players. We’ve noted in the past that Zac Hosking can cover lock and centre if needed, as can Simi Sasagi. Canberra could theoretically fit four or five of these players in the one line up if you wanted to get fantastical (for clarity, only as a thought experiment, I wouldn’t recommend this).

A year ago this position was causing us to ring the alarm like the Fu-Schnickens were going to come off the bench. We’d gotten to hoping that Morgan Smithies – a consummate middle – might be able to cover the edge. We were wondering whether Clay Webb might be able to make the step up. Now we have stars, depth, and pipelines. This is an astounding situation.

Do me a favour and like the page on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or share this on social media because we are just men, just innocent men. Don’t hesitate to send us feedback (dan@sportress.org) or comment below if you think we are stupid. Or if we’re not.