NRL 2021: Newcastle Knights defeat Canberra Raiders 24-16, fifth straight loss for Ricky Stuart’s men
Ricky Stuart is adamant the Raiders are a “happy camp” but their on-field form would say otherwise after they threw away another big lead against Newcastle to suffer their fifth straight loss.
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Besieged Canberra coach Ricky Stuart is adamant the rumours of discontent at the club are only gossip and the truth is he has a united team ready to fight its way out of a worrying five-game losing streak.
The Raiders equalled their worst run of defeats on Stuart’s seven-year watch after throwing away a 16-point advantage to go down 24-16 to Newcastle in Wagga Wagga on Saturday.
It was yet another second half collapse on the back of a week of drama over the playing future of English duo George Williams and Josh Hodgson and a social media spray directed at Stuart by the wife of interchange forward Joe Tapine.
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But a grim-faced Stuart insisted: “They’re problems that you read, they’re not problems inside the camp. They’re problems that everyone enjoys reading and speculating on, but we’re a happy camp in regards to what you read.”
Told he looked subdued in the dressing-room, Stuart replied: “Did I? That’s good.
“I don’t get fired up over a bunch of blokes who are doing everything they possibly can to play their best to win a game of football.
“We will stick together and keep working hard to get through this rough patch. “Things aren’t going for us at the moment. We’re just not getting that little bit of luck and bounce (of the ball) at the moment. We’ve got to persevere and stay strong.”
This loss will hurt deeply as the game appeared to be in Canberra’s keeping at halftime.
They led 16-0 but dropped off alarmingly as the Knights launched a comeback off the back of some Kalyn Ponga brilliance. He scored a try and set up the match sealer for Jayden Brailey.
The Raiders failed to score a point after the break, continuing their worrying trend of second half collapses. Losing middle forwards Joe Tapine and Ryan Sutton to injury didn’t help the cause, but it’s still no excuse.
The Knights scored two minutes after the interval after catching the Raiders off guard with a short kick-off and used that momentum to take control.
Ponga did it all himself on the hour, scoring a great individual try to bridge the gap to just four. When Tyson Frizell crossed in the 67th minute, the Knights led for the first time.
With injury-hit Canberra running out of interchange players, Newcastle shut down a series of late raids and scored through Brailey to claim their first win in seven games.
Proud Knights coach Adam O’Brien said: “It was a performance that we needed. It was what we wanted.”
THE REAL NEWCASTLE
O’Brien challenged his side to stand up and show him “the real Newcastle” after they copped it in the neck from critics following last week’s big loss to the under-manned Roosters.
They delivered in spades.
Down 16-0, they could have easily thrown in the towel and slid to another inglorious defeat. But instead they dug deep to complete their biggest comeback in seven years.
Ponga, as is normally the case, was again the difference in a typically classy display.
“It hurts, definitely. They (the players) do care,” O’Brien said of the criticism.
“There was no shortage of people that had an opinion on what sort of character we have, but we brought that on ourselves. But this is only one game. It’s not going to go away (the questions over character). There’s still a lot for us to get better at.”
WELCOME BACK BIG PAPA
A week after being rested in bid to get his head back in the game, Canberra enforcer Josh Papalii returned to his destructive best.
The broken down version of the early rounds gave way to the Queensland Origin star we know as he ripped in from the start, regularly bending the defence and producing a series of his trademark offloads.
He even managed a clever grubber kick on the back of a line break that almost led to a Raiders try. Papalii clocked up 109m run metres and played with plenty of energy.
With homesick halfback Williams playing with great freedom, Canberra jumped out to a 16-0
halftime lead on back of tries to Tapine and Bailey Simonsson before it all fell apart.
‘WE STILL BELIEVE’: WILLIAMS STAYS FOCUSED
Homesick Canberra halfback George Williams has spoken publicly for the first time since rumours surfaced of his desire to quit the club at season’s end.
While chief executive Don Furner has backed the club to put in measures to support the English international, Williams confirmed he had spoken with the club about his situation.
The 26-year-old has one year left on his deal but has already been linked with a move to Warrington as a replacement for Gareth Widdop. With his partner expecting their first child and uncertainty surrounding travel, Williams has indicated he wants to return to England.
“It’s fine,” Williams said. “I spoke with the club and told them where I’m at. Me and the club will do that ourselves. It’s not about me. Five in a row isn’t good enough for the Canberra Raiders.”
Williams looked unburdened by his future in the first half helping guide the Raiders to a 16-0 lead with two line break assists and a try assist. However the Raiders capitaulted in the second half prompting Williams to apologise to the Raiders faithful and declare there was “too much chat and not enough action”.
“We still believe in ourselves to go all the way,” Williams said. “People might laugh at that but (there is a) long year ahead of us.”
Furner, the game’s most experience boss, said the club had dealt with homesickness before given the amount of imported players in Canberra’s ranks.
“That’s part of what you have to deal with,” Furner told ABC Sport. “You put whatever you can around him. Unfortunately for English players that bubble is still in place.”
Williams dominated headlines last week but he was not alone at the nation’s capital. Furner confirmed the club had spoken internally about social media use to the playing group following Joe Tapine’s wife public criticsm of coach Ricky Stuart.
“A lot of those points came up were two or three weeks old,” Furner said. “When you’re losing games, that sort of stuff happens. No one said anything when they were winning.
“These are things you have to go through running a business or club – home sickness, players getting dropped.”
Despite the Raiders form slump, Furner said the club were right behind their coach.
“Coaching is a hard job,” Furner said. “It’s easy to sit back for a few losses and throw knives out. “We’re not a club that doesn’t back the coach.
“It wouldn’t have been a big issue if we were winning.”
Josh Hodgson’s decision to step-down as skipper also came to light in recent days.
Like Williams, Hodgson has been linked with a move out of the club. Furner rejected talk the hooker, who is set to return from injury this week, was being squeezed out of the club.
Hodgson stayed in Canberra to continue his rehabilitation from a calf injury.
“Is he talking to the Broncos, I don’t know,” Furner said. “He is contracted to us and he will be with us until 2022.”
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