BY ROB

On Saturday, in the warm rays of sunshine on the Gold Coast, the Raiders played their last game of 2025. Their immediate future already determined, they played simply for pride and dignity. Unfortunately the Titans were playing for a finals berth.

The Raiders conceded points just three minutes into the game, the Titans setting up shop in the red zone and then breezily executing a right side overlap to nab their first try.

At the 8 minute mark Canberra hit back with a left hand shift that culminated in Relna Wuruki-Hosea diving over in the corner. The play actually started with Chante sending the ball right from dummy half, but Zahara Temara, her halfback senses tingling, identified a near imperceptible fault in the Titans right side defence, linking with Preston who threw a perfect cutout for Wuruki-Hosea.

Relna’s defensive nightmare continued when the Titans returned to her corner with another overlap, this time forcing her to choose the inside threat, which resulted in the outside option getting the ball, jinking back inside of a desperate Temara cover effort and scrambling over for the Titans second try.

Seven minutes from the break Temara proved once again why she’s the perfect playmaker to mentor Elise Simpson, her running game sowing doubt (and gaps) in the Titans line before a short ball found the young fullback with enough space to hotstep her way between two disconnected defenders.

The Raiders would extend their lead even more before the half was out, this time courtesy of Emma Barnes who gave prompt service to a barn-storming Amelia Pasikala who simply cannoned through three defenders to plant the Steeden. The Raiders headed to sheds with a 16-8 lead.

Pasikala nearly made it across the stripe early in the second half, her powerful run, punctuated by strong fends, cut short just metres out. From there the second half devolved into an arm wrestle, neither side getting up until the Raiders fouled the Titans on a kick, leading to a penalty goal.

This brought the Gold Coast back in range and their attack reignited. Canberra tried desperately to keep them out but in the dying minutes the Titans got a ball away behind the Raiders defensive line and levelled the scores at 16 all.

Golden point had just gone two and a half minutes when Lauren Brown decided she’d had enough of waiting, set up 30 metres out and slotted a field goal to seal the win and the Titans spot in the finals.

And so we finally put the NRLW Raiders 2025 campaign to bed. A season that started bad, got way worse and then improved over three games before falling in two competitive losses at the season’s end.

The Raiders have a lot to work on for next year, and a long time to wait before they can reunite as a unit. There will no doubt be personnel changes between now and then, but the club needs to do their best to retain as many of these women as they can.

With Canberra still essentially a FIFO prospect for many of its NRLW players the club will need to find a way to maintain squad cohesion for the 7-8 months that players aren’t together, or risk another poor start in 2026.

We are very sorry this took so long. Do me a favour and like the page on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or share this on social media because love is true and heaven is a Raiders victory. Don’t hesitate to send us feedback (dan@sportress.org) or comment below if you think we are stupid. Or if we’re not.