Raiders' finals contention is on the line

I’m tipping you’re right there Thumper. Somehow I don’t think they are playing for good-will.

It could also be that at the roosters the players might take a bit of a pay-cut in order to stand a better chance for Origin/National Selection or even win a premiership. They aint doing that at the Raiders at the moment…

Both raise some pretty good points. Junior players are a vital investment into a clubs future. Teams like the Cowboys and the Tigers are now starting to see the benefits of cultivating home grown talent.

That being said GF has pointed out that it seems to be an awful lot of money for what is really a ‘too young’, ‘too old’ or ‘second string’ team. You’d think the Raiders would have to be one of the best paying clubs in the game?

I watched the game on Fox, the Raiders had no ball for the first half, made 140 tackles to 70, and were unlucky to be down at half time. Jason Smiths kicking game was ordinary – why wasn’t Carney used more there? the Warriors two tries in the second half were from a Carney slip in defence on the line well exploited by Fein, and a lucky scramble from a Jones bomb in the corner to seal the deal.

The green men just ran out of petrol against the giant Warriors team. Matt Adamson made about 3 or 4 silly handling errors, but was also dangerous every time he held on to it

As for positives, Carney is improving every game he plays with Jason Smith. Thompson and Nugget Millar are going well, Jason Williams will improve with more fitness and Croker is continuing his great form (when he doesn’t try to be a ball player…)

It was a tough loss – one that has realistically ended the Raiders hopes for the year, but with a little bit of luck, could have ended up being one of the best Raiders wins of the year…

For me it has been the emerging younger players. The Raiders need to build on that and make sure they don’t leave.

Some new forwards (Jason Williams) joining through the year have also been promising. I think Michael Weyman will forever be plagued by injuries, but I hope I’m wrong.

But for a $3.3 million salary cap, there are no big stars of the game on the Raiders books.

Still pissed off about the lack of coverage the Raiders games are recieving on free-to-air TV. After watching five minute highlight reels for every other game played of every other code, the Raiders got about twelve seconds of air time last night. Absolute disgrace.

I don’t like the Raiders chances against Brisbane at home, although it’s been the sort of season where anything can happen. Broncos looked pretty strong against a reasonably good bulldogs lineup on Friday night, so I think it will be a big ask of the Green Machine to step up to the plate.

All in all, it’s not been a terrible season for the Raiders, they’ve managed to stay in touch and played some pretty good footy.

There are a couple of things they can learn from the year; one of these is to look long and hard at the captaincy and leadership roles of the senior players. They may also want to start looking at recruiting a little more proactively if they want to be seen as a team to be reckoned with.

What positives can you see from the year?