Some possibly bad news here with Carney though from today's CT:
Campese shows his pedigree in finals win
RAIDERS 42 EELS 30
By Peter Fitzgerald Rugby league
Sunday, 19 September 2004
A serious ankle injury to teenage sensation Todd Carney soured the Canberra Raiders Premier League side's 42-30 victory over Parramatta in yesterday's elimination final at Leichhardt Oval.
When Carney initially suffered the injury, the Raiders were comfortably leading 18-4. But within seven minutes the Eels had scored two tries to narrow the margin to four points and send a chill down the spine of Raiders coach Wayne Collins.
Enter five-eighth Terry Campese.
In an almost arrogant display of football, the nephew of former Wallaby great David Campese, guided his team around the field and eventually to victory.
With Parramatta first-grade coach Brian Smith and a number of top-level players watching on from the grandstand, Parramatta secured the first two four-pointers of the second half to level the scores at 24-24 before Canberra, lead by Campese, stamped it's authority on the game to come away victors.
Carney was escorted from the field in the 26th minute and was unable to return after badly twisting the upper region of his left ankle.
The 18-year-old was forced to watch the remainder of the match from the sideline, despite trying a number of times to return to the action.
The victory for Canberra means it will play St George Illawarra in Saturday night's preliminary final at Aussie Stadium for the right to contest this year's grand final the following week.
For Carney, an intense week with Raiders Physiotherapist Ed Hollis will determine whether or not he will don the green jersey in next week's cut-throat semi-final. "The ankle got caught under two players. One came in from the right and one from the left and it was pretty painful because it got dragged along," Carney said.
"The guys were telling me not to worry about playing again but I was like, 'It's our last game if we lose', so I kept trying to keep it warm but the injury was too bad to go back on.
"I'll work on it all week. I'll have a light week of training but with a lot of physio work and hopefully it will be right for Saturday night."
Collins was relieved his side was able to conquer not only the Sydney heat but also the tough lead-up to the match to be able to come away with the win.
"It's been a real tough week for us, especially with mad Monday involved for some of the guys," he said.
"As a unit, you get comfortable - both with the result you had last week and a few extra guys coming back from first-grade.
"Also, plenty of guys really struggled in the heat. Despite it being only a couple of degrees different to Canberra, it made a huge difference to some of the guys believe it or not."
After Kris Kahler scored two late tries to seal the win for Canberra, Collins couldn't help but look immediately to next weekend's clash with the Dragons.
St George Illawarra claimed the minor premiership on percentage over the Sydney Roosters and Collins was wary his side's path to the premiership would hit its biggest hurdle on Saturday night.
"They're the best team in the competition," Collins said of the Dragons.
"All I can say is that we're still in there so we're some chance.
"We've got some really good young players who I hope are enjoying this ride and I hope it can continue past next week."
AT A GLANCE RAIDERS 42 (K Kahler 2, J Russo, P Graham, T Carney, D Porter, N Smith tries; N Kouparitsas 4, T Carney 2, T Campese goals) bt EELS 30 (J Williams 2, M Gruszka, L O'Dwyer, B Delaney, C Muckert tries; M Witt 3 goals).
NEXT WEEK: Preliminary final - Raiders v Dragons (Saturday night, Aussie Stadium).
He killed it in Bank cup for dickson aswell.
