Canberra Raiders

After last week's one-point loss to the Warriors – the third straight narrow, late loss from a winning position – Stuart attempted to divert the post-match narrative from the team's performance onto the match officials.

But after their worst performance of the year to date, Stuart admitted he had protected the players from criticism for too long and used the word "soft" no fewer than 10 times to describe a first-half capitulation that at one stage included three tries conceded in five minutes.

The 19-year-old Papali'i limped off early in last week's 20-8 win over Gold Coast and has since been ruled out for up to six weeks with a medial knee ligament sprain.

He'll be replaced in the second row by ex-Titan Pulu, who has twice started on the bench this season and will line up alongside Tohu Harris and lock Ligi Sao.

As a result, fellow Warriors recruit Agnatius Paasi comes onto the bench, where he'll join another new face in Jazz Tevaga, who replaces Sam Cook.

Coach Stephen Kearney talked up Pulu's NRL pedigree.

The Ottio family is still grieving over the loss of a son and brother that would have celebrated his 24th birthday on Tuesday, March 20.

Moments after the Canberra Raiders suffered defeat at the hands of the Newcastle Knights at Canberra Stadium on Sunday, the two clubs combined to pay tribute to Ottio.

Ottio died of heatstroke in January, two days before he was due to fly to England to join the Super League's Widnes Vikings.

The unstoppable grunt factory led by massive front-row pairing Shannon Boyd (122 kilos) and Junior Paulo (123 kilos) routinely won the battle of the middle of the field that year.

Throw Josh Hodgson’s wily dummy half play into the mix and a powerful, athletic backline and Stuart had found an intoxicating recipe for rampaging attacking football that took his side to second on the ladder and a preliminary final with the Storm.

Brennan received a nightmare initiation, watching the Titans concede three tries inside the first 10 minutes.

But he left his first match glowing about the character of his players after they recovered to snatch victory with a Konrad Hurrell try from an Ash Taylor grubber with less than two minutes on the clock.

The rookie mentor wanted the youngest halves pairing in the Telstra Premiership to take control of their team and the end result was Taylor and his partner Kane Elgey creating all five Titans tries.

And that’s why Canberra coach Ricky Stuart has enlisted the help of multi-premiership winning Raiders legend Mal Meninga this year.

Stuart revealed in November he had spoken to his fellow club legend about a consultancy role with the Raiders, designed specifically to help Croker develop as a leader.

And while Croker played down Meninga’s job when asked about his work, he revealed he regularly meets with the current Australian coach who has become a mentor of sorts.

Hodgson plans to get in the ear of several off-contract teammates to try to convince them to stick around in the nation’s capital.

He signed a four-year extension with the club in November that will keep him in the lime green until the end of 2022.

But his fellow Canberra spine stars — Austin and Sezer — are yet to commit beyond 2018 and appear no certainty of staying put.

Towards the end of last season there were reports linking both players to rival clubs. Most recently the Daily Telegraph reported Canterbury is trying to lure Sezer to the kennel.

At 7.30am this morning, the NRL Rugby League club held a memorial service at the Holy Trinity Church, Curtin, for the young Kumul player gone way too soon.

The service was open to members and fans who wanted to pay their final respects to Ottio.

The former Mounties star died earlier this week, sending shockwaves through the rugby league world.

The late Ottio would have departed PNG shores for the United Kingdom today to join Widnes Vikings along with fellow Kumul teammate, Albert Wellington.

Abbey has joined the club for pre-season training and comes with a classy junior resume, including an appearance for the New Zealand Warriors at fullback in the 2014 NYC Grand Final, and representation of the Junior Kiwis.  

He made his NRL debut for the Bulldogs in 2017 playing four matches and scoring one try. 

May barged his way over by the posts with just seven minutes remaining to effectively clinch a spot in the Finals for the Panthers, with Canberra – who eliminated Penrith in the semi-finals last year – now needing to win their last two fixtures and rely on results elsewhere going their way to do the same.

Nathan Cleary became the youngest player to score 200 points in an NRL season when he touched down following a burst down the right from Waqa Blake, whose opening score was answered in kind by Nick Cotric.