With seven out of eight matches in Round 23 set to have an impact of the makeup of the Telstra Premiership finals, rugby league fans should rightfully be excited.
The most excited of them all is our man in the middle, Brad Fittler, who joins NRL Daily host John Gibbs on tonight’s show to take a look at each match.
Friday night kicks off with a blockbuster on the Central Coast between heavy weights Manly and South Sydney. This all-Sydney top four clash kick-starts Fittler’s excitement, with the battle of the five-eighths already giving him goosebumps.
On Saturday night everything is on the line for the Wests Tigers and Dragons as they return to Allianz Stadium where they have competed in several highly memorable matches.
“I’m excited about watching two polar opposites go up against each other with everything on the line,” says Fittler. “One side grinding and calculated; the other carefree, bordering on careless!”
While most people’s eyes will be fixed to the Bulldogs in their clash with Brisbane on Sunday, Fittler’s focus will be elsewhere.
“I’m not even going to watch the Bulldogs,” says Fittler. “I’m just excited to see how the Broncos respond to everything.
“They’ve been in poor form, their halves have been copping it publically, they’ve dropped Josh Hoffman for discipline reasons, and as they say you’ve never coached until you’ve lost four straight games. I think Anthony Griffin is about to find out what it is to be a coach!”
Then, if you still have energy left, the round wraps up with Wayne Bennett looking to steer his Knights back into finals contention against a re-energised Todd Carney, who Fittler believes is “something special when he’s firing”.
Also on tonight’s show we take a look at this week's Versus head-to-head match ups and resident Toyota NRL Dream Team guru Rob Bruns gives you his tips heading into Round 23.
Get all this and more in tonight's episode of NRL Daily, the only NRL show that's on every night of the week.
Stream it on the NRL.com homepage from 7:00pm tonight, watch it on the official NRL mobile site (Telstra customers only. Action Pack required. Click here for more details) or Telstra T-BOX. You can also watch the best NRL Daily videos on your iPhone with the official NRL iPhone App (Official Pass required. Click here for more details)
