{"id":58294,"date":"2025-08-10T19:19:16","date_gmt":"2025-08-10T19:19:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/58294\/"},"modified":"2025-08-10T19:19:16","modified_gmt":"2025-08-10T19:19:16","slug":"harawira-naera-set-for-nrl-comeback-as-bulldogs-push-to-sign-former-star","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/58294\/","title":{"rendered":"Harawira-Naera set for NRL comeback as Bulldogs push to sign former star"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Canterbury Bulldogs appear ready to welcome back former second-rower Corey Harawira-Naera, who is set to make a long-awaited return to NRL action after more than two years out of the game.<\/p>\n

Harawira-Naera has not played since suffering a serious on-field seizure during a 2023 match while representing the Canberra Raiders against the South Sydney Rabbitohs, and has been sidelined ever since that injury.<\/p>\n

Over his career, the second-rower has played 123 NRL games, representing the Penrith Panthers, Canterbury Bulldogs, and Canberra Raiders.<\/p>\n

Despite the challenges, the Sydney Morning Herald revealed in May that Harawira-Naera has been medically cleared to return to first-grade rugby league, with the NRL confirming it will not block any club from registering him if offered a contract.<\/p>\n

MORE:\u00a0Bulldogs lock in Bailey Hayward as future hooker with long-term extension<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe’ve gotten to a place where I can start looking ahead and planning to get back on the field,\u201d Harawira-Naera told the publication.<\/p>\n

\u201cKnowing in the back of my mind that there’s a chance of getting back on the field, I felt lighter straight away. A whole lot of heavy head noise subsided pretty quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Harawira-Naera had hoped to resume his career with the Raiders, reports indicate that Canberra are reluctant to take the health risk, prompting him to seek opportunities elsewhere.<\/p>\n

The Daily Telegraph reports that this has opened the door for a potential reunion with Canterbury, with the 30-year-old expected to join the club on a one-year train-and-trial deal.<\/p>\n

Although the Bulldogs have solid second-row options in Viliame Kikau and Jacob Preston, Harawira-Naera could earn a bench role if he impresses coach Cameron Ciraldo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Canterbury Bulldogs appear ready to welcome back former second-rower Corey Harawira-Naera, who is set to make a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58295,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-58294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58294"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58294\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}