While the three omissions don’t bode well for the overall talent on display at Glen Willow, it shapes up as a strong advantage for the home-side heroes as the Dragons will fancy their chances a lot more now.

While the team sheets haven’t been released yet, it’s safe to assume both Souths and St George will put their best teams on the paddock but probably won’t be willing to risk players carrying niggling injuries.

It’s not as if these three players have had a clean bill of health in recent times either.

Adam Reynolds has been in a walking boot for the last three weeks with plantar fasciitis, Greg Inglis hasn’t played since rupturing his ACL in 2017, and even though Angus Crichton would probably tell you he’s good to go, he had his middle finger amputated in December last year.

With all of this being said, when one door closes another one opens. In this case, three doors are opening for South Sydney players with young guns like Adam Doueihi, Robert Jennings and Bathurst’s Dean Britt likely looking at more playing time come Saturday.

The Dragons on the other hand should – touch wood – send out a stacked roster after putting their best team on the paddock against Hull FC in their first pre-season trial on Saturday and although Ben Hunt and James Graham were the most spoken about players in the lead up to their debut appearances, someone else stole the show.

22-year-old fullback Matt Dufty ran for over 200 meters in just 68 minutes of play and will be looking to outshine his opposite number on Saturday and South Sydney’s Alex Johnston was in scintillating form himself on the weekend.

Both of these squads appear to have enough depth to field two 13-a-side squads each on Saturday so a few South Sydney withdrawals won’t be enough to take the oomph out of this one.