✂️ Round 10 ShortCuts

Magic Round come downs, CTW come ups

May 07, 2025

Cheapies exploding, forgotten stars reminding us of their class, and fresh faces catching our too-early-to-panic bye-planning radar – Magic Round delivered in spades.

With sin-bins taking a back seat and tries flowing freely, it was a round full of SuperCoach shake-ups and breakout performances.

Enough of the past...
Time to ShortCut.

🧠 What You Need to Know

  • Back to normality with a Thursday night kick-off (7:50 pm AEST)

  • First bye round is Round 12 – chill – see below for who to target

  • Plenty of coin-flip matches to get wrong in your tipping comp

  • Dom Young given the green light to leave... back to the Knights?

  • Brandon Smith to the Rabbits?

  • Perth confirmed as the 18th NRL team

  • Fifita is free to leave

  • Time to upgrade those cash cow CTWs to guns, but…

  • Now’s a good time to save trades and plan for bye coverage

🔄 Ins and Outs

➡️ IN

  • Campbell - ankle

  • Humphries - hamstring

  • Mitchell - suspension

  • Burton - suspension

  • Pasifiki-Tonga - Guler replacement

  • DWZ - wrist

  • RTS - 18th man

  • To’o - hamstring

⬅️ OUT

  • Cant - dropped again - get rid

  • Preston - crushed someone’s neck - allegedly

  • Cotter - suspended

  • Mamouzelos - elbow

📆 Fixtures

💰 Buy 🤝 Hold 🚮 Sell ⏳ Wait ❌ Avoid

🔥 Buy

  • Farnworth – gun, base, set and forget

  • Garrick – great Origin coverage, kicking base

  • Ponga – cheap as chips, on the come-up

  • Fermor – dual, -24 BE, go Lucas first though

  • Lucas – big yes, dual, lock and load

  • Marzhew – the beast lives on

  • Brown – season keeper

  • Hynes – form returning

  • Clark – monster minutes/work rate

  • Couchman – big work rate, though pricey

  • Sharpe – has the game for big scores; a lot are going there

  • McInnes – boring but safe if you need a HOK

  • Drinkwater – 5 of 13 games outside QLD

Scott Drinkwater, everybody - 5 games outside QLD in 13 rounds of footy

✋ Hold

  • Jenkins – benched, Origin will help mins, 1 BE

  • Tamale – holding value, 30 BE

  • Cant – peaked but not urgent

  • Hubner – peaked but not urgent

  • Horsburgh – not urgent, Origin (?) approaching

  • Egan – peaked

  • Starling – value slipping; no clear upgrade options

🗑️ Sell

  • Gutho – served his purpose, will start leaking; better options

  • Shibasaki – move on/upgrade to a keeper

  • Purdue – easy move to an elite CTW, 100 BE

  • Grant – hamstring + Origin risk

  • Watson – Origin looming

⏳ Wait

  • Teddy – plays every bye round

  • Kiraz – Origin watch

  • Drinky – draw is nuts, 12 BE, wait until after Round 12

  • Campbell – awkward price + draw

  • Willison – role dependent

  • W. Egan – injury risk, decent fallback

  • Fa’alongo – flashy, low base

  • Halasima – minutes watch, fun to own, good draw

  • King-Togia – no job security (yet); Munster replacement at Origin?

  • R. Smith – Hands on bench

  • Hughes – injury question mark; wait until Origin

❌ Avoid

  • Cleary – Origin coming, will miss plenty

  • Munster – Origin

  • Patea – low minutes; better options in FRF; frees up cash

  • Simpkin – needs big minutes

👀 Bye Watchlist

Roosters, Cowboys, and Knights have a favourable bye schedule and should be seriously considered.

Here’s a ‘way better than we could ever explain it’ article from SC Playbook if you’re keen to go deep.

We aren’t – so just grab a few Roosters, Cows, and Knights over the next couple of weeks.

👨🏼‍✈️ Captain Obvious

Last week’s suggestions: May (87), Hynes (117), Ponga (98)

  • Papenhuyzen at home during the day is hard to resist – I’d hate to watch this without him as captain. Key metric.

  • Haas against a battered Rabbits = safe

  • Ponga vs a leaky Titans = great VC

  • Cleary on a fast track vs Cows is enticing

  • Sharpe is a loose VC play if you have something safe behind

Any combo of these – just make sure your VC plays before your Captain – and you should be sweet.

❌ Mr. X

Round 9 performance

On the block: Cant, Hubner, Purdue, Gutho

Heading into Round 10

This week’s trades (at this stage)

  • In: Lucas + Ponga

  • Out: Gutho + Cant

  • VC: Ponga

  • C: Papenhuyzen

Two Knights, but their bye run is elite.
Toss-up between Sharpe and Ponga.
Gutho did his job – probably a week late on him.
Purdue and Tamale on the block next week.

Easy Sit vs Start this week with the Roosters on the bye and Jenkins benched. Easiest sit vs. starts of the season

🎬 Final Play

And that is us for Round 10’s ShortCuts.

Ensure you are leaning towards Roosters, Cowboys, and Knights players over the next couple of weeks. Apart from that, don’t overthink it.

Hold strong, trade wisely, and may the SuperCoach gods smile upon you.

✂️ SCSC

Enjoying the ShortCut? Flick it to a mate drowning in SuperCoach chaos.