{"id":648789,"date":"2026-05-04T10:14:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T10:14:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/648789\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T10:14:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T10:14:18","slug":"nrl-news-2026-dolphins-prop-daniel-saifiti-medically-retires-due-to-shoulder-injury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/648789\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL news 2026: Dolphins prop Daniel Saifiti medically retires due to shoulder injury"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dolphins<\/a> prop Daniel Saifiti<\/a> has confirmed his medical retirement after 191 matches and has opened up on the selfless reason behind the call.<\/p>\n

The former NSW Blues star has been sidelined for the past year due to a serious shoulder injury and Saifiti will now step away from the NRL.<\/p>\n

Saifiti played the majority of his career with the Newcastle Knights<\/a>, having come through the club’s pathway system, before joining the Dolphins last year<\/a>.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Morris raises ‘genuine fears’ for Origin as new NRL norm sets in<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Why 35yo Aussie veteran is firming for World Cup<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Team tips: Dragons in spotlight as five players face scrutiny<\/a><\/p>\n

The front-rower also played seven State of Origin matches and three games for Fiji.<\/p>\n

\"Daniel<\/p>\n

Daniel Saifiti.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Speaking to media after the announcement, Saifiti explained the decision and admitted he had “known for a while” that retirement was a possibility.<\/p>\n

“The shoulder’s just not holding up,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We tried our best to do full contact and all that type of stuff, but it just would have become a liability and would have been unfair on me and the team.<\/p>\n

“I’ve probably known for a while to be honest, it’s just risking more damage and it’s just going to affect my quality of life after footy. Two young kids and I want to have more and a beautiful partner … it would be selfish of me to keep going.<\/p>\n

Watch the 2026 NRL season live and free on Nine and 9Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“I said it to the boys it was the hardest [decision] but it was also easy too.<\/p>\n

“If I don’t have kids maybe it’s different, but when you’re struggling to pick the kids up when you come back from training, it makes the decision pretty easy.”<\/p>\n

Dolphins boss Terry Reader paid tribute to the retiring veteran on Monday.<\/p>\n

“There is no doubt Daniel was our best player in the first eight weeks of last year and we have really missed him since then,” Reader said.<\/p>\n

“It is sad for it to end this way but Daniel has had a career he can be proud of, and he will continue to add to our club off the field this year.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Daniel and Jacob Saifiti\u00a0NRL Images<\/p>\n

The 30-year-old had undergone an “extensive rehabilitation process” but the injury had not recovered to a level necessary to play again. <\/p>\n

Saifiti and brother Jacob burst onto the scene with the Knights a decade ago, becoming the first set of twins to debut in the same NRL game.<\/p>\n

The pair were constant fixtures in the Newcastle side during a tough on-field period before things turned around with top-eight finishes in 2020, 2021, 2023 and 2024.<\/p>\n

Daniel moved north to Redcliffe at the end of 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dolphins prop Daniel Saifiti has confirmed his medical retirement after 191 matches and has opened up on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":648790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-648789","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\/648789","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=648789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/648789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/648790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=648789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=648789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=648789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}