NRL Conclusions: Victor Radley update, Panthers’ unsung hero and the Roosters’ big issue

The sound you can hear is bottles crashing – and they’re milk bottles.

Minor Premiers Canberra exited the finals after two straight defeats, ending a previously stellar season meekly against a Cronulla outfit that is suddenly peaking at exactly the right time.

The Raiders were very lucky in their draw and select individual matches (frauds!) or a young team that did superbly well and will only be stronger for the experience (ominous!). Obviously, it’s a bit of both, and the sound you’ll hear when the glass settles is that of a Premiership window creaking open.

There was another game on Sunday, where the Panthers took on the Panthers tribute act and, to the surprise of very few, proved far better than the Bulldogs.

That’s the end of Canterbury for another year, meaning both first weekend losers exited at the earliest possible opportunity.

The narrative that this comp is wide open persists, but the smart money (just ask the bookies) is that we’ll get a Melbourne-Penrith Grand Final all over again.

Throw in a Wigan-Hull KR repeat in the Super League and you’ll ask yourself why we bothered playing hundreds of games in the first place. It all meant something at the time, right?

Existentialism aside, there was some good footy played this weekend – starting in Canberra.

A good week for…

The Sharks, who went a long way to ending their finals hoodoo with a superb win over the Raiders on Saturday night.

Canberra became the first Minor Premiers to go out in straight sets since the Dragons in 2009, but to focus on them would be to miss the Sharks’ best showing since lifting the Premiership in 2016.

This is a side that has been written off repeatedly – including, it must be said in these pages – and castigated for their inability to defeat tough opponents.

It’s very hard to say that now. Cronulla have defeated Canterbury, Easts and now Canberra in consecutive games, and looked better each week in doing so.

They signed Addin Fonua-Blake for this time of year, and it’s paying off. Blayke Brailey’s strong midseason form against poor teams has carried over into excellent year-end form against good ones.

Most of all, Nicho Hynes, one of the most maligned and doubted players in the comp and a man seen by many as the epitome of the unserious, flat track bully Sharks, stood up and won them a big game.

The thing about finals is that you have to keep doing it until the end, with the difficulty always increasing.

Melbourne in Melbourne is as tough as it gets for away trips, but the Sharks have been second favourites in both weeks so far, so that won’t bother them.

Last year they reached a Prelim and were flogged by the Panthers. It felt like they were no closer to winning anything. Now, regardless of what happens at AAMI Park next week, this will feel like progress.

A bad week for…

Canterbury, who copped an all-timer from Penrith to exit the finals on Sunday afternoon.

The Dogs were already behind the eight ball given the injury to Stephen Crichton, but picked the worst possible moment for their defence to collapse as the Panthers ran in six first half tries, creating the biggest half-time finals deficit ever.

Missed tackles are a largely junky, meaningless measure, but if you miss 42 in a single half, as the Dogs did, you’ll not win many games.

Then again, completion rates are almost as useless a stat as missed tackles, but if you go an hour without making a single error, as the Panthers did, you’ll not lose many games.

In our preview, the differential in spines was mentioned as a key reason why the Panthers would win – which turned out to be the case.

Dylan Edwards set up a try, so did Mitch Kenny. The Bulldogs barely laid a glove on Isaah Yeo and Nathan Cleary, as you might expect at this time of year, was imperious. Four try assists, a mammoth 40/20, a try of his own and seven of eight from the tee.

Try beating that. The Warriors couldn’t. Neither could Canterbury. Brisbane are second favourites next week and rightly so.

Standout…

We could write this about Nathan Cleary every week, so instead, let’s throw some love towards Paul Alamoti. The Panthers winger got a hat trick, completing a huge turnaround in fortunes across both this year and several before it.

He scored in last year’s Grand Final, but was jettisoned to reserve grade midway through 2025 and had to fight his way back into the side.

Tom Jenkins impressed in his stead, but Ivan Cleary somewhat controversially returned to Alamoti when the serious stuff started and has been handsomely rewarded.

Taking an even longer lens, Alamoti is a Bulldogs junior who grew up in Milperra in the heart of the Canterbury-Bankstown district, excelled in the lower grades and was tipped for big things all the way through the juniors.

Everyone who had seen him in reggies understood what the hype was about, but in one of Cameron Ciraldo’s rare missteps since joining the Doggies, he was cut after just one season in grade.

Penrith swooped and have reaped the benefits ever since. A raw but talented centre has now been refined into a well-rounded, hard-running, composed winger.

Alamoti is a Bulldogs fan and likely would have enjoyed his side winning a Premiership – but you could see it meant plenty to show his old side – and his doubters from midseason – what they were missing.

Washout…

Kaeo Weekes, who may or may not have been on the field as Canberra crashed out on Saturday night.

The fullback has been one of the most electrifying players in the league, but ended with a whimper, unable to add any life to the Raiders’ attack as their finals hopes drifted away.

Canberra had already been rocked by the late withdrawal of young gun half Ethan Strange due to illness on the day of the game, forcing very-much-part-timer Simi Sasagi into the five eighth role.

They needed Weekes to be at his creative best to overcome the loss of Strange, but instead, struggled to get him into the game at all.

Weekes is young and probably ahead of schedule on where many thought he would be. He’ll take the learnings from this finals series and take them into future campaigns.

That will be the hope for all of the Raiders. Nobody expected them to achieve what they did this year and, for most of the group, this is very much the start.

Losing in straight sets after finishing first in the regular season sounds terrible, but as time goes by, they’ll realise that winning the Minor Premiership is the big takeaway from this year. 2026 should see an even better Canberra.

Everyone is talking about…

Victor Radley, who has copped an enormous fine for his part in the Brandon Smith Sunshine Coast drugs affair.

The Roosters lock had his text exchanges with Smith and an alleged drug dealer splashed all over the newspapers, followed by an internal disciplinary process that saw a ten game ban and a $30,000 fine levied.

Throw in that the ban is a suspension without pay and you’re looking at over $150,000 in total financial penalties, which even by Australian standards, is an expensive night out.

Even with that, the Roosters still look weak. They were forced to act by their Chairman, Nick Politis, making a rod for his back by promising a zero tolerance policy for cocaine.

When you employ a raft of young, rich men from the Eastern Suburbs, that is a timebomb waiting to go off, and a mere wander over the road from the club’s headquarters to any of the adjacent Paddington hostelries on a Friday after work could have confirmed as much.

Politis tried to save face on his ‘zero tolerance’ comments by saying that it was as big a punishment as they’ve ever dished out, but zero tolerance means you’re sacked, and any solution that left Radley in a job doesn’t pass the, err, sniff test.

Radley has accepted the sanction, but the Rugby League Players’ Association (RLPA) has not. They contend that it sets a dangerous precedent and contravenes the agreed Collective Bargaining Agreement with the NRL and its clubs.

Had the club opted to sack their man, they might have found themselves in a court for wrongful dismissal, as the player has not been charged with any crime, or suspended by the NRL, or tested positive for actually taking the drugs he allegedly acquired.

Really, his only crime is getting caught, and he didn’t really even get caught – Brandon Smith did, and Radley was dumb enough to be in his phone records.

Politis has made an almighty rod for his back and Radley apologised for dragging the club’s name through the mud. By acting the way they have, the Roosters haven’t so much cleaned the dirt off as rub it all over themselves.

But nobody mentions…

The other six blokes on the Sunny Coast trip.

Radley has been punished for the tangential involvement in a crime – in essence, the suggestion of a drug purchase – but what about his fellow golfers? The order was for three grams, so unless he’s got a massive problem nobody knows about, you’d have to think that other people were involved.

One does not have to be Tony Montana to understand that cocaine is a drug to be shared, particularly in that quantity, so why aren’t James Tedesco, Chad Townsend, Hugo Savala, Zach Dockar-Clay, Egan Butcher and Sandon Smith being fined and banned?

The idea of Tedesco, captain of the club, a former captain of Australia and NSW and the raging hot favourite to pick up the Dally M in two weeks’ time, finding himself banned for ten games to start the 2026 season because he was two degrees of separation from a cocaine transaction is faintly ridiculous.

It’s also the logical and fair thing to do when you’ve already banned someone else for being a good enough mate to get the bags in for the boys.

It’s been mooted that they might ban midseason trips instead, because of course, the best way to avoid cocaine is to spend more time in the Eastern Suburbs.

The point here is that it’s all ridiculous. Cocaine isn’t rugby league’s problem. The NRL knows this, because you have to get caught three times to get your name in the paper about it.

Zero fans think that this is the Roosters’ fault, and the vast majority don’t really care at all what the players do on their bye rounds, as long as they keep winning football matches.

If Dockar-Clay had gone to meet Brandon Smith’s mate, he would have been fired, but if Teddy had, it probably wouldn’t be a suspension at all. Maybe they should factor that in next time the bat signal goes up.

Forward pass

Look, there’s two Preliminary Finals, obviously, but seeing as we’ll do a full preview later in the week, let’s go a level down.

It’s already Grand Final week in the state comps, with the Dragons and Warriors set to clash in the NSW Cup and Burleigh and Norths Devils facing off in the Queensland Cup.

The Warriors defeated Parramatta this weekend to give the NSW Cup the final it deserves, pitting first against second from the regular season.

The Wahs have been the best all year by a mile, but struggled in the finals as Tanah Boyd and Sam Healey were called up to the NRL. Both starred in a comfortable win to secure the Grand Final berth.

They now face a Dragons team with Hayden Buchanan, Mat Feagai and Loko Pasifika Tonga dropping back, as well as now-stalwart Lachlan Ilias, who is unlucky not to have played more first grade this year.

Up north, Rohan Smith’s Devils scored in the 78th minute to sneak past Wynnum-Manly 18-16. Burleigh were slightly more comfortable, edging Redcliffe by the same scoreline, but scoring in the 76th minute to do it.

The Devils now go for a fourth comp in five years, while the Bears haven’t triumphed since 2019.

The winners of both will then face off for the State Championship, the curtain raiser on Grand Final day and the true Sickos Superbowl. It’s great, see you there.