GNR4LIFE
Well-known member
Teddy was never staying in hindsight.
Signings, Suggestions & Rumours Discussion
- Thread starter MacDougall
- Start date
Well he had already reneged on a signed deal with Canberra, so the writing was on the wall...
GNR4LIFE
Well-known member
Teddy at the Raiders. Just can’t picture it.
Nonotmeagain
Well-known member
Roar_Power
Well-known member
Demps, these guys are all handy but how many managers would be telling them to avoid the Tigers aka career suicide....and the ones that come are potentially on inflated deals. Just feels like we are struggling to gain any traction in recruitment this year.
Hopefully Richo has a plan and using the extra cash from releasing players to front load contracts and have funds available for some future big fish.
innsaneink
Well-known member
Galvins gunna double him to the airport on his pushy
GNR4LIFE
Well-known member
I agree with most that a tough & hard, take no prisoners style of middle forward leader is something we lack and really need, but I seriously doubt we would get anywhere near their best, or any value out of players approaching 35 years of age such as Josh Papali’i or Tyson Frizell.
Obviously if we could get one of them at a low cost that would not hurt our salary cap then why not, but I would not be spending up around 500k or more on these types of ageing players.
A genuine tough tackling, ball playing 13 would also help.
Not much available in this regard either, but a few people have mentioned Kobe Hetherington or Adam Elliott. Hetherington is more of a ball runner, than a ball player and generally plays better when he starts off the bench, while Elliott has all the traits we are looking for, but has become extremely injury prone and hardly gets on the field these days. I would be happy to offer Elliott a smaller contract as we could not pay him too much and risk it being wasted if he continues to be regularly injured.
We initially bought Jack Bird to do this job, would it not be a good idea to play him more regularly as a ball playing 13 for the rest of this season to see if he still has it in him to solve this problem?
I believe we need a point of difference in our forwards, someone who is athletic and fast and capable of making regular tackle busts and line breaks.
Myself and quite a few others have regularly floated the idea of signing David Fifita and I still think that’s a very good option, however we would be paying up around 900k to have him released from the Titans for 2026 and on that money, he is a big high cost risk.
The player I would be signing for 2027 and beyond and hopefully convincing he and his club to release him early to us for 2026 is Simi Sasagi.
At 24 years of age and with plenty of NSW Cup experience, he is only recently starting to play with the confidence to demonstrate the tackle bust and line break ability at NRL level, that he has shown while playing NSW Cup for the past couple of years.
I believe he’s exactly the versatile, fast, athletic, tackle busting, line breaking forward we are lacking.
The added bonus is he’s also a very capable centre, therefore if Sam Fainu recaptures his best form it would be no issue starting games with Fainu on our left edge and bringing Sasagi into games as an impact player, similar to how Ricky Stuart is mostly using him now.
Why would he consider leaving the Raiders ?
Well I think he would currently only be on a very minimal contract of no more than 200k and when the Raiders are full strength with Hudson Young, Matty Nicholson and Zac Hosking all playing, it’s unlikely there will be room for Sasagi in their top 17, regardless of how well he is playing,
I think he’s ripe for the picking, he’s approaching his prime and realistic chance of being released early to play for us in 2026 if we sign him come November 1 for 2027 and beyond.
Obviously if we could get one of them at a low cost that would not hurt our salary cap then why not, but I would not be spending up around 500k or more on these types of ageing players.
A genuine tough tackling, ball playing 13 would also help.
Not much available in this regard either, but a few people have mentioned Kobe Hetherington or Adam Elliott. Hetherington is more of a ball runner, than a ball player and generally plays better when he starts off the bench, while Elliott has all the traits we are looking for, but has become extremely injury prone and hardly gets on the field these days. I would be happy to offer Elliott a smaller contract as we could not pay him too much and risk it being wasted if he continues to be regularly injured.
We initially bought Jack Bird to do this job, would it not be a good idea to play him more regularly as a ball playing 13 for the rest of this season to see if he still has it in him to solve this problem?
I believe we need a point of difference in our forwards, someone who is athletic and fast and capable of making regular tackle busts and line breaks.
Myself and quite a few others have regularly floated the idea of signing David Fifita and I still think that’s a very good option, however we would be paying up around 900k to have him released from the Titans for 2026 and on that money, he is a big high cost risk.
The player I would be signing for 2027 and beyond and hopefully convincing he and his club to release him early to us for 2026 is Simi Sasagi.
At 24 years of age and with plenty of NSW Cup experience, he is only recently starting to play with the confidence to demonstrate the tackle bust and line break ability at NRL level, that he has shown while playing NSW Cup for the past couple of years.
I believe he’s exactly the versatile, fast, athletic, tackle busting, line breaking forward we are lacking.
The added bonus is he’s also a very capable centre, therefore if Sam Fainu recaptures his best form it would be no issue starting games with Fainu on our left edge and bringing Sasagi into games as an impact player, similar to how Ricky Stuart is mostly using him now.
Why would he consider leaving the Raiders ?
Well I think he would currently only be on a very minimal contract of no more than 200k and when the Raiders are full strength with Hudson Young, Matty Nicholson and Zac Hosking all playing, it’s unlikely there will be room for Sasagi in their top 17, regardless of how well he is playing,
I think he’s ripe for the picking, he’s approaching his prime and realistic chance of being released early to play for us in 2026 if we sign him come November 1 for 2027 and beyond.
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Tom Shines
Well-known member
Geez … some of you were pushing the Sexton dream there for a bit … not even a micro second to reflect on him preferring to play in France instead at age 24?
Next !
Next !
GNR4LIFE
Well-known member
Tbf to him, I’d rather live in the south of France instead of Belmore.
HabboTiger
Well-known member
Papali'i (Canberra) also going to Hull KR im pretty sure i saw
Tom Shines
Well-known member
Yeah sure … but he is now in is NRL prime … he could still head over there in a decade …
Probably the Dogs have paid him out and more and sent him away so he doesn’t get to blab about how disappointing it is for Galvin to take his spot
He’s supposedly playing very well and he would provide good depth, but he’s really only a fullback only, so doesn’t offer much versatility.
He is similar in stature to our own Luke Laulilli and while Luke doesn’t yet possess the same class of ball playing quality that Tristan possesses, Luke runs the ball just as well, possibly better and you would think young Luke still has plenty of improvement to come.
I would rather stick with Luke or Turuva as our back up fullback in this instance.
When is he going to France, now or for 2026 ?
I’m very surprised the Titans or some NRL club didn’t sign him, he’s proven he can steer a team to the top of the table and he kicks the ball on the 5th tackle, that’s something our current halves could learn from him.
Tom Shines
Well-known member
Not sure when …I suspect the Dogs have made it worth his while to leave the NRL … no risk of him playing well next season elsewhere and showing them up … when he is back in a year or two, the caravan has moved on
Roar_Power
Well-known member
I think he is a pretty good chance of coming across.
Do you think he would improve our NRL team or do you mean sign him as a depth player ?
Is he a better player than Sukkar or Sol Saukuru ?
He’s probably got a better work rate and a more reliable defender than them, but he’s a lightweight edge forward and I believe Sukkar and Saukuru have much more impact when running the ball due to their extra size.
Saukuru in particular has the size, power, mobility and potential to trouble the very best of defences, his issue is his lack of fitness which can be fixed in an offseason if the desire is there.
It’s much harder for a player such as Hassett to become bigger and more explosive when running the ball, however he’s a solid worker and still only young, so we could do much worse than him as a depth signing.
