Canberra

League history

Final ladder position each season on record (1982–2025) — 1st at the top. Hover a point for the exact position and field size that season.

Club history

The Canberra Raiders entered the NSWRFL in 1982 as its 14th club, built around the Queanbeyan Blues and coached in that first season by Don Furner Sr., after the ACT franchise bid beat rival applications from Campbelltown, Newcastle and the Central Coast. Alongside the Illawarra Steelers, admitted the same year, Canberra became the first club based outside Sydney to join the premiership since 1909 — and the first from an Australian state or territory other than New South Wales, a genuine step toward a national game. The club took the name "Raiders" with a Viking theme and adopted lime green with blue and gold bands, playing its formative years at Seiffert Oval in Queanbeyan (1982-89) before shifting to the newly built Bruce Stadium (later GIO Stadium) in 1990.

Canberra's golden era arrived under coach Tim Sheens, who took charge in 1987, and captain Mal Meninga: premierships in 1989, 1990 and 1994, anchored by a spine including Ricky Stuart, Laurie Daley and Meninga himself. The 1989 grand final against Balmain, won in extra time through a length-of-field Steve Jackson try, is still rated among the greatest grand finals ever played. Since 1994 the Raiders have struggled to lure representative-calibre talent to a comparatively small capital-city market, enduring long stretches without silverware, though a run to the 2019 grand final under Stuart — by then head coach — signalled revival.

Grand Final appearances (1987-2019)

Sources

• Canberra Raiders — Wikipedia
• History of the Canberra Raiders — Wikipedia