NRL Round 18 review: Origin fallout and the Sharks' rise

After a week off to focus on State of Origin we’re back with our weekly NRL review series.

This week the fallout from State of Origin continued, the Sharks made their finals push, and a young player took the most of an opportunity in Auckland.

Theme of the Week: Coulda, shoulda, woulda
It was inevitable after NSW were flambéed in Origin 3 that the round immediately afterwards would be dominated by discussion about the future of the NSW team.

Blake Austin set the tone for the discussion early on Friday night with a remarkable 15-minute hat-trick on a balmy Canberra evening to effectively play Newcastle out of the game before they even got into it. Incredibly Austin recorded only 16 touches of the ball for the entire game of which three were the tries and seven were kicks.

Austin plays with boundless energy and thrives on playing a supporting role. It is clear that if he can continue his current form in 2016 then he will be a legitimate contender for a sky blue jersey in 2016.

The theme continued on Saturday evening as once and future Blue Blake Ferguson dominated the Panthers. Even aside from the two try assists and six tackle breaks, Ferguson, along with his right side running mate Shaun Kenny-Dowall, excelled at bringing the ball out of their own end, an area of the game in which NSW were truly awful on Wednesday night.

With his height and top heavy build Ferguson is incredibly difficult to bring down once he gets going and he used that advantage to good effect, consistently getting the Roosters out of the danger area and allowing his epic forward pack to take the late set impact runs. All things being equal his inclusion in the NSW side in 2016 is a foregone conclusion.

Also in the ‘what about me’ category of performers over the weekend was Wade Graham, who continued his recent form by shredding a Dragons right edge that badly missed Tyson Frizell (another 2016 candidate for NSW). After being miscast as a five-eighth while at Penrith and in his initial seasons at the Sharks, Graham has been transformed as a ball-playing, hard-running left-side second rower.

Graham is averaging over 130 metres per game in the second row and leads all second rowers for tackle breaks. With Ryan Hoffman ageing and Boyd Cordner struggling to adapt his game to Origin level, Graham is looming as the obvious candidate to fill the NSW left edge in the near future.

The shadow of Origin wasn’t just limited to future Origin contenders either. There were also some standout performances from former Blues players who were overlooked for part or all of this series. Andrew Fifita and Luke Lewis were both magnificent again for Cronulla and Kurt Gidley was outstanding… oh no, wait, that’s right Gidley was awful.

Team of the Week: Cronulla Sharks
After starting the season with four consecutive losses the Sharks have now won eight of their last twelve games and sit on the cusp of the top eight with only their poor for and against holding them back.

After dropping a winnable game in Manly in Round 17 the Sharks bounced back admirably by stomping the dead-in-the-water Dragons on Sunday afternoon. Led by powerful performances from Graham and Fifita and, according to overly simplistic members of the Channel Nine broadcast team, a single tackle on Ben Creagh, the Sharks imposed their will on a Dragons team missing several key players.

While the introduction of Jack Bird to the starting five-eighth role and the bold move to shift Ben Barba to the bench has been instrumental in the Sharks’ success, it is their mighty forward pack that is putting the team in a position to succeed.

Even without Paul Gallen, who largely seems to use Sharks games as pre-season for Origin, for large parts of the season, the Sharks pack has been outstanding in recent weeks. NSW discard Luke Lewis has responded strongly to his omission from the rep side and along with Graham and Gallen he forms probably the strongest back row in the game.

This weekend the Sharks travel to Canberra for an utterly crucial game for both teams. If the Sharks win they will not only put themselves into the eight but they will have likely killed off the Raiders’ season, narrowing the field of contenders for a finals berth.

Hey who’s that guy? Raymond Faitala-Mariner
While there is plenty of hand wringing at Origin time about the impact that it has on club sides as key players miss games, one positive is the opportunity it presents to young players.

Warriors back rower Raymond Faitala-Mariner is one such fringe player who has benefited from the opportunity. Primarily a NSW Cup player since moving out of the Under-20s competition at the start of 2014, Faitala-Mariner has played five games in first grade this year, most of them during the Origin period as Hoffman missed time for the New Zealand side.

While his raw numbers on Sunday afternoon were not as impressive as his previous outing in first grade against the Titans, Faitala-Mariner played nearly a full 80-minute game and had a number of key involvements to demonstrate that he belongs in first grade.

Faitala-Mariner is off contract at the end of the season and is still only 21 years old, the age at which many forwards begin to thrive after adding a layer of toughness in reserve grade. It will be no surprise if another team attempts to pinch him this off-season with the lure of more playing time.