The Raiders fought hard to come back from 18 points down in a thrilling finish against ladder leaders the Melbourne Storm.
It was a gutsy win that saw the Canberra boys play 20 minutes of football with just 12 players.
But it was through tries from captain Jarrod Croker, Jordan Rapana and the match winner from Josh Papalii that allowed the Raiders to come back with 22 unanswered points in a stunning finish over the home side.
They’ve now won five of their last six and will take on a fourth place in-form Manly Sea Eagles side at GIO on Sunday as they continue their push towards a top-four finish.
Possession was evenly split between the two top four sides with the Raiders forced to play much of the opening 30 minutes with just 12 men after Jack Wighton was sent to the sin bin just four minutes into the game and Joseph Tapine also sent 12 minutes later.
However, it was the Raiders who were able to complete 31/39 of their sets at a rate of 79%, slightly above the home side who completed 29/37 of their sets at a rate of 78%
The penalty count was reasonably high in this matchup, however, it remained relatively even. The Storm made 11 errors and conceded 10 penalties, while the winning side made 10 errors and conceded eight penalties with two sin bins.
Ricky Stuart’s side continue to go from strength to strength this season and Saturday night’s game was no exception. The Green Machine came out on top in running metres against the home side. The Raiders ran for a total of 1540 metres from 182 runs, with the Storm side finishing with a total of 1352 running metres from 154 runs.
In attack, Canberra thrived off second phase play dominating in the offload count. The Raiders produced 11 offloads to keep the ball rolling and three linebreaks, while the home side completed a total of six offloads and two linebreaks.
In defence, the Melbourne boys were the busier side of the two as they made a total of 328 tackles compared to the Raiders 292. It was Canberra however who recorded more missed tackles with 22, while the Storm missed a total of 19.
Individual statistics:
In his 150th club milestone game, it was Jack Wighton who made the most metres with the ball at 179 metres while recording the most runs on the field with 18, equal to teammate Corey Horsburgh.
Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad put in yet another stellar performance for his team running 152 metres in 16 runs with 32 post contact metres, while also finishing with a try assist.
Jarrod Croker led his team in true captain spirit scoring 14 points including the first two tries for the Raiders to get the ball rolling.
It was Josh Papalii who scored the winning try for the Green Machine while making 101 running metres in 11 runs with 33 post contact metres. While also making a strong impact in defence making 32 tackles.
John Bateman and Josh Hodgson played equally important roles in defence for the Raiders making 39 and 37 tackles respectively.
