BY DAN

The Raiders and Morgan Smithies have been circling each other since July last year, unable to close the deal to keep the Englishman at the club beyond 2026. Is this just a dance between the club and his management, or a more complex maneuver? Just what is going on?

A negotiation of this length has been highly unusual in recent times for the Milk, at least in its public acknowledgement. We’ve seen this enough to know the beats. The Raiders announce they’re starting negotiations. Then they say a deal is close. Then before you know it a deal is reported or announced, (presumably depending on whether the agent wants someone to publicise their work).

It was identified in July that Smithies was looking to extend with the club, with Smithies telling the Canberra Times he loves the club:

I love this club. Obviously, if the opportunity came, I’d definitely take it. What this club’s done for me, they’ve looked after me, given me a chance, and I’d love to repay them.

Morgan Smithies

Smithies probably lent it to the positive too far for his famously hard-nosed manager Sam Ayoub. Smithies wasn’t technically on the market until 1 November. Expressing your desire to basically do the club right before they can even leverage the needs of other clubs isn’t how most managers would advise their clients to act.

Waiting for 1 November to see what was out there doesn’t entirely explain the situation. It didn’t stop Ata Mariota signing before he hit the free market. Mariota was similarly effusive to the Times about his desire to stay in Canberra (“the teammates that I have here, I love everyone, so I want to stay here as long as possible”), has the same management company (Ultra Management) and presumably the same manager (Sam Ayoub, though the Times reporting only specifically identifies Ayoub as Smithies manager). Mariota’s negotiation was announced at the same time as Smithies. And yet his deal was resolved in the most part before November (although as reader Deane P points out, despite being reported as a fait accompli it hasn’t been officially confirmed).

In their reporting just before Christmas, the Times said the club had placed a deadline on a Smithies deal at the end of 2025. Don Furner had noted to the paper that the international football season had interrupted discussions, and the hope was a bit of pre-season clear air would support a deal being brokered. That’s obviously passed; explained by the fact that his manager (Ayoub) was on holidays. Evidently no one is in a rush, at least on Smithies’ side of the leger.

In these cases, the most obvious explanation for distance from a deal is sweet cash. It’s hard to ascertain the external demand for Smithies. He was an improved player in 2025, maintaining his aggregate output despite only playing about two-thirds of the minutes with Corey Horsburgh’s return. He was a better passer and runner, increasing his metres per run (7.25 to 7.8), increasing his line break assists and try involvements. He’s a good defender, and his ability to lock up the middle in defence is a critical part of Canberra’s ability to use Tapine and Papalii in more attacking roles.

But he’s hardly an athletic marvel, more honest than dynamic. New teams would love to have someone like him to build around, and the Bears just signed someone of his archetype in Josh Curran. Perhaps the strategy is to drag this out to see if/when the Bears or the Chiefs come knocking. That option has been out there for a while now and still we’ve heard nothing.

If demand from somewhere else is driving the delay then we’re yet to hear of it. It may be that the sweet cash is the problem, in that Canberra aren’t offering enough and haven’t budged in a way that Ayoub and Smithies would prefer.

It presents these coming weeks as a critical juncture. Most people are back now, and we’re going deep into the pre-season now. Smithies would likely love a deal in place before the season starts, if only to provide certainty beyond 2026 and provide insurance against the ever-present risk of major injury.

At some point, the dance has to end. Smithies wants to stay, the Raiders want him to stay, and the role he plays in the middle is too valuable to leave floating in contract limbo. For a roster balancing youth, cohesion, and continuity the Milk would be happy to have the Englishman’s contract sorted. Smithies would be wise not to gamble his future on the hope that a better offer materialises.

The risks in negotiations like this don’t reduce over time. They elevate and often get messier. If both sides want this sorted – and as far as we can tell they do – it would make sense to get this sorted out.

So what are we waiting for?

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