BY ROB

I was going to write some stuff about the NRL, in particular who’s good and who’s not, but then Dan went and wrote his Six, Again piece, making one of my topics redundant (like Dan I think this is a truly open competition, and even the top two in the Dogs and Storm are yet to have their mettle tested properly). So instead I’ll cover some other stuff.

Wheel of Crackdown

If you’re able to cast your mind back to the preseason challenge you’ll recall officials being sticklers for correct play-the-balls. Players were required to brace their foot against the Steeden and then roll it back to the waiting dummy-half.  For the first two rounds of the season this crackdown was in full swing with players getting pinged every so often for not doing a good/convincing job of playing the ball.

Fast-forward to round six and any pretense of policing this aspect of play has vanished. I watched four of the eight games across this round and I cannot recall an attacking player being penalised for this transgression. Errors were called when players couldn’t control the ball whilst getting to their feet, but no actual penalties for trying to cut corners. And corners were cut. Players seem to have cottoned on that if they make a convincing stab at it refs will accept the ball being rolled back by hand, provided the “ball-playing” foot makes a general kind of ball-rolling motion (there were also a few cases of the laughable “just step over it” style which also went unpunished).

My suspicion is that we’ve collectively moved onto the next crackdown: forceful contact with the head. If I’ve learnt one thing in the last two weeks it’s that the word “moderate” covers a broad spectrum, and can be applied selectively, even to offending tackles that are carbon copies of each other. One man’s face is another man’s “shoulder”.

If we were to dig deeper into the head contact subject we could explore the definition of “forceful”, and whether or not binning a player three tackles on is a good look for a sport that relies on momentum so much, but as I’m tired and semi-coherent we’ll leave it alone for now.

Year of the Second Rowers

Maybe it’s because the Raiders have a bumper crop of edge forwards the year after saying goodbye to Whitehead, but 2025 really feels like a season built for 2nd rowers. Young and Nicholson have nine tries between them already, and have the kind of form that has Blues selectors salivating (and in Matty’s case making Raiders fans very grateful that he’s ineligible for Origin). Chuck in the soon-to-return Hosking and the ever-improving Sasagi and you can see why we’re all getting a bit hyped right now.

Elite edge forwards command a premium nowadays, so it’s quite the thing to have just one in your team. Hosking and Nicholson both have the potential to become great 2nd rowers themselves, and Sasagi is developing into a properly competent and capable bench player.

One indicator of their rise across the league is their increased appearance on the bench. In days of yore coaches would run a 3 prop/1 utility bench, in a bid to keep their big men up front constantly refreshed. These days are gone now, as teams have shifted to a more diverse set-up in the interchange.

Most benches now run a back-up/understudy hooker at 14, with two props and a second rower to round them out. A good second rower, particularly one skilled in ball-playing, is a prized asset on your bench, as they can either cover in or out as needed. You can send them on for a gassed/injured prop, or push them out to the wing if you have to remove a centre.

Already this year we’ve seen coaches running a hooker/ 2 X 2nd rower/prop set-up, utilising the defensive stamina of their smaller bench forwards as their teammates tire in the final minutes. Keep an eye on team lists in the coming weeks and see if there’s a coach out there trying to evolve the way they rotate their players.

Will we see more crackdowns before year’s end? What about a bench with two hookers, a 2nd rower and a utility backliner. If a coach hits breaking point anything’s possible.

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