News of a foot injury for Kalyn Ponga that will sideline him for several months has delivered a crushing blow to the Knights’ hopes in 2024, while it’s big news for a fifth of all Fantasy coaches too.
With Ponga sitting in just over 20 percent of teams at the time of writing, he’s going to be the biggest trade out ahead of Round 8.
Given he's worth $757k, most coaches are going to be in a position to swap him for another top-tier player in his position and still save money.
In order of preference, these are the elite WFBs I'd be going after to replace Ponga this week.
1: Scott Drinkwater (WFB, $750k)
On the face of it you'd think Drinkwater would have a much lower floor than he's shown this year, simply because he's a ball-playing type of fullback rather than a metre-eater who gets huge numbers in running. But the opposite is true and his season-low of 41 proves it.
Even when the Cowboys play poorly – which they really did in last week's collapse against the Sharks – Drinkwater is usually at the heart of any good stuff they do, which gives him enough to still tick over decent scores.
When they do play well his potential is huge, and again the 81 earlier this year is evidence of his ceiling, with his role in the North Queensland attack meaning he's always likely to be in on the assists and a good chance of grabbing a four-pointer himself. He won't play Origin but does have byes in two of the three major bye rounds (Round 16 and 19).
Scott Drinkwater continues to shine for the Cowboys
2: Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad (WFB, $648k)
One of the best WFBs in the game in terms of generating base stats, CNK’s appetite for running the ball means that he is good for 25-30 points each week off running metre metrics alone, with a further 10-20 points likely to go with that from the inevitable tackle breaks all that work brings him.
With that as his starting point it doesn’t take much on the attacking front to then lift him into the high 50s or 60s, while it also means that when the Warriors do have an off day – like last week’s hammering at the hands of the Dragons – Nicoll-Klokstad is unlikely to register a disastrous score.
He’s not going to play Origin, but like Drinkwater and the Cowboys he has an unfavourable bye schedule for overall players given the Warriors sit out two of the three major bye rounds (13 and 19). Prior to last week he had a 65 and 69 to his name, and with games to come against the Titans and Knights in the next fortnight, who are both leaking plenty of points in 2024, the outlook is good for the Warriors’ No.1.
3: Tom Trbojevic (WFB, $681k)
He should have the potential to be the highest ceiling WFB around thanks to his ability to pile on tackle busts, line breaks, tries and assists very quickly when he takes over a game.
But the trouble is even though he's been playing well on the field in 2024, it's not translating to regular monster scores, with just one above 60 so far back in Round 5.
In saying that his floor is nice and high, with even his five-error showing against the Dragons this year ending in a 39, meaning Turbo is a safe buy who is going to get you close to 50 most weeks. He's in a good team with a strong attack, so there is a heap of upside with bringing him in.
Turbo gets a double on the Gold Coast
4: Dylan Edwards (WFB, $745k)
The Penrith custodian has been excellent over his past five games, boasting a 58.6 point average through that period, which has included scoring four tries. He’s coming off consecutive scores of 67 and 62 and is red hot at the moment.
Edwards has got a favourable run coming up with games against bad defensive teams in the Cowboys and Rabbitohs, while in Round 11 he faces the Warriors who he had 73 against the last time he played them.
He plays a very tidy game with minimal demerits in Fantasy and so far this year has lost just 10 points from errors in six games. The only question mark will be whether he can keep this up now Nathan Cleary is back (he averaged 49 points through the three games Cleary was there for this year) and at the very least he stands to lose 6-10 points per game from goalkicking.