NRL 2020: Canberra Raiders to give Kai O’Donnell debut for Storm clash
The Raiders family has been hit with some tough setbacks this week, including a diagnosis nobody wants to hear, but the special bonds forged in the club provide hope and strength.
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Strong people make up great football clubs. Which is why great football clubs pull together in tough times.
Like they are doing down at Canberra right now.
Let’s just say it hasn’t been the greatest of weeks for the Raiders heading into Saturday’s big clash against Melbourne.
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Ricky Stuart’s middle forwards have been dropping like flies.
After losing Corey Horsburgh following the loss to Parramatta, now they’ll be without Sia Soliola and Emre Guler for an extended period.
Then on Tuesday they got news Pete Mulholland’s cancer was back.
After the rugby league news cycle of this week, it sure puts a few things in perspective.
Mulholland, the Raiders’ recruitment boss, is not only one of rugby league’s most likeable blokes but one of the most respected as well.
It doesn’t matter who you talk to, they only speak fondly of “Skull”.
Which is easy to understand when you listen to the positivity with which Mulholland is tackling his latest fight.
Mulholland was on his way home on Tuesday after learning of his relapse. I had phoned to ask about this young rookie forward, Kai O’Donnell, who will make his NRL debut off the bench against the Storm.
The way Mulholland put his own circumstances to the background so he could focus on a young man’s once-in-a-lifetime moment showed again why he is held with such great esteem.
Over his career, which has spanned several decades at the elite level, Mulholland has literally handed thousands of young men their rugby league dream. But what is just as impressive is how he remembers every single story like it was the most significant.
In O’Donnell’s instance, this kid was one of the first Mulholland signed after getting his first symptoms of non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma almost two years ago.
Mulholland rattled off O’Donnell’s story like he does every player.
How the youngster hailed from north Queensland and had been living on the Gold Coast when he signed him to come down last year and play Jersey Flegg.
“And by the time I’d negotiated the deal with his manager, his girlfriend had arranged an apartment in Canberra,” Mulholland said proudly.
“Not only that, she had arranged work and Kai had arranged a job for himself. And they were ready to come down here all within three days.”
He loves kids with that go-getter attitude, and O’Donnell hasn’t looked back since.
But neither has Mulholland, continuing to work throughout his ordeal, while the Raiders as a club have had his back the entire way.
Which is probably why Mulholland was so keen to get back to work this week, even when he had every reason to want some time off.
“Honestly, if I think too much about it I am not all right,” Mulholland conceded.
“So I try not to spend too much time thinking about it. That’s what I said to Rick and Don (Furner, Raiders CEO). ‘I’ll tell you what’s wrong and then we’ll just forget about it and get on with what we do’. That’s the best thing.”
And that is why Saturday can’t come soon enough.
While almost everyone is writing off the injury-ravaged Raiders, they are busy getting ready for an enormous fight.
Stuart gave us a rare insight into what happens behind closed doors at Canberra when he allowed his media department to film that wonderful moment when he told O’Donnell he would be getting his debut on Tuesday. The irony was it happened at about the same time Mulholland was told of his situation.
With all the players seated in front of him, Ricky spoke about the need for his senior players to stand up in the wake of their run of injuries, and why this would also present opportunity.
When he called out O’Donnell’s name, it was the pride in the room that bubbled to the surface which really identified the Raiders’ spirit.
It’s been amazing how Ricky has overseen this rebuild.
When he came back to coach the club he starred for as a player, Canberra was flat out signing anyone of note.
At one point a senior NRL official even mocked that the Raiders wouldn’t represent a pin prick on the rugby league map if the NRL was to be started up today. But brick by brick Ricky and Furner have put this club back together. And by adding people like Mulholland along the way, the Raiders are back to being star billing.
Because even when they are down on their luck, you just know they will still come out fighting.
Stuart is shattered for Mulholland.
“I knew something was wrong,” Mulholland said. “You know your own body and you get to sense when something is not right. I have been short of breath and had a dry cough, which was the first signs I had two years ago. I just have to deal with it now.”
But football is his solace.
“I mean it, there are a lot of people worse off than me,” he said.
“I’m OK. I get to go to the football on Saturday and watch a young man make his NRL debut. The way I look at it, we got to the grand final last year. Now we’ve got to get to another one and win the premiership. That’s what we have to do.”
TIGER CUB READY FOR REP STEP
When South Sydney’s Damien Cook goes head-to-head with Wests Tigers’ Harry Grant for the first time on Friday night, it will be a sneak peak into the future.
The game has had some great dummy-half rivalries over the years. Think Benny Elias and Steve Walters, Danny Buderus and Cameron Smith.
This could be the next chapter.
You get the feeling Grant’s first shot at the Australian No.9 won’t be his last. Even better, one’s a New South Welshman, the other’s a Queenslander.
Cook is 29 and has 108 top-grade games in the bank, Grant is 22 and has played just eight NRL games.
While there has been much talk about where Grant will play his club footy next year, his arrival on the rep stage will only be a matter of time.
Meanwhile, Cook hasn’t had the greatest start to the season.
Peter Sterling said this week Cook would be under pressure from Api Koroisau to retain his NSW jumper if the Origin teams were picked now, especially given Koroisau’s club combination with Nathan Cleary.
Grant would be the leading contender for the Queensland dummy-half spot, although Jake Friend would have strong support.
Benji Marshall said last week Grant was ready for Origin now.
Grant has come from nowhere to be second on the Dally M leaderboard behind Clint Gutherson.
Cook hasn’t been bad for the Bunnies but is nowhere near his best. While Rabbitohs coach Wayne Bennett is happy with Cook’s form, he looks to be spending too much time thinking instead of going for it under the new ruck interpretations.
The fact South Sydney have lost a fair bit of grunt in the pack following the retirement of Sam Burgess has also made Cook’s job a lot tougher.
LEILUA HIS OWN WORST ENEMY
At his best, Joey Leilua is as damaging as any centre in the game.
But it’s nothing to do with bad luck that he has never played State of Origin. And, at 28, you’d probably think any chance is now past him.
A few years back Leilua would have been my first centre picked for NSW when he was playing his best footy for Canberra.
But discipline was always the issue with him and it’s not getting any better by the looks of things.
It’s a great shame but Wests Tigers would have to be seriously rethinking their decision to sign him until the end of 2022.
The moment Leilua’s younger brother, Luciano, was accidentally concussed in Wests Tigers’ loss to Penrith last weekend, you knew straight away Joey would end up costing his team the game.
It’s really disappointing to see a player with such unbelievable talent constantly shoot himself and his team in the foot.
SIX-AGAIN RULE A WIN FOR NRL
Bunker blunders and forward passes aside, you’d have to go all the way back to the 1990s to remember a better time in our game’s history when it comes to the quality of footy we are seeing right now.
That game last Thursday night between Melbourne and the Roosters was as good a club game as there has ever been.
Not far behind it was the previous week’s clash between Parramatta and Canberra, and before that the Roosters’ win over the Eels.
And it’s all thanks to the six-again rule that some people were blowing up about when it was introduced.
I can’t remember a time when so many rusted-on fans were talking so positively about the quality of the games.
And to think Peter V’landys was being criticised for rushing through the one ref and six-again changes.
It goes to show yet again how a lack of leadership held the game back for way too long.
Originally published as NRL 2020: Canberra Raiders to give Kai O’Donnell debut for Storm clash