The Raiders were able to come away with a gritty 20-12 win against the Wests Tigers on a cold Canberra night at GIO stadium.
The match on Saturday night was, of course, the 30th anniversary of the 1989 grand final victory against the then named Balmain Tigers and it shaped up to be a tough defensive battle for the boys in green.
The green machine managed to finish on top recording 52% of possession throughout the game and completed 29/37 of their sets for a rate of 78%. Wests Tigers were only able to complete 29/43 of their sets for a rate of 67%.
Match Highlights: Raiders v Tigers
Ricky Stuart’s side kept their discipline for most of the match keeping the penalty count relatively low, only conceding a total of six penalties. However, it was the visitors who won that battle conceding only four.
The home side ran for a total of 1589 metres from 173 runs, while the Tigers finished with a total of 1634 running metres from 185 runs.
In attack, Canberra completed seven offloads and three linebreaks while their opponents managed a total of eight offloads and four linebreaks.
In defence, the Tigers were the busier side as they made a total of 380 tackles compared to the Raiders 342. The Tigers made more missed tackles with 32 compared to the home side missing a total of 25.
Individual statistics:
Josh Papalii made a dominant impact off the bench putting in an exceptional individual performance as he made 31 tackles and ran for 202 metres in 18 runs with 81 post contact metres.
Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad was the next best in metres made with 151 in 16 runs while also scoring a try in the first half.
Round 18 In the sheds: Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad
Bailey Simonsson led the way for the Raiders in tackle breaks as he recorded six, while Jordan Rapana and Jack Wighton both recorded five.
In defence, Josh Hodgson funded the most amount of tackles for the Raiders with 44, John Bateman finished with 37 tackles.
