For nearly a decade, one unwanted statistic has hung over South Sydney Rabbitohs forward Euan Aitken: he has not played a single NRL finals game since his debut rookie season in 2015. Now, with just a few weeks left in the regular season, that long drought is finally on the cusp of ending — and not even a debilitating case of influenza A that cost him four kilograms in 10 days can derail his goal.
The topic of long finals dry spells entered NRL conversation earlier in 2024, when Luke Brooks finally ended a 229-game streak without a post-season appearance. Now, Aitken sits atop the list of active players waiting for another taste of finals football, with 198 regular-season games under his belt since his only finals clash nine years ago. Back in 2015, Aitken’s St George Illawarra Dragons fell a single point short against the Canterbury Bulldogs, losing 10-11 in a match that saw star playmaker Benji Marshall depart early with a severe ankle injury.
Aitken has moved through four NRL clubs since that 2015 match, with stints at the Dragons, New Zealand Warriors, Dolphins and now the Rabbitohs. He holds an 18-game lead over Wests Tigers forward Alex Twal — who has never played a finals game in his career — and sits ahead of former Dragons teammate Blake Lawrie, who has gone 154 games without a post-season appearance since his last finals run in 2018. Aitken came close to breaking the drought back in 2018 himself, but a hamstring injury in the penultimate round of the regular season ruled him out, extending his wait for another shot.
This weekend, Aitken will hit a personal milestone, taking the field for his 199th NRL game against his former club the Warriors, before notching his 200th career match on the Gold Coast the following week. For the Rabbitohs, a spot in the top eight (and a place in the 2024 finals series) is well within reach, requiring only consistent results across the remaining weeks of the regular season to lock in their post-season berth. Aitken is far from the only Rabbitohs player still chasing a first or long-awaited finals appearance: teammate Jayden Sullivan has never featured in a finals game, Matt Dufty has not played post-season football since 2018, and Sean Keppie and David Fifita have both waited five years for another chance.
For Aitken, ending the drought has been his top priority all season. “I’m probably one of the longest-serving players that hasn’t played finals since my first year, so it means a lot to me to get in that team and play finals footy,” he explained. “That’s the only thing I had written down before the start of the year was to play finals, so hopefully I’ll be able to get to do that over the next few weeks. It stings. It hurts the most. That’s all you want to do as a footy player is win games, play finals and try for that ultimate premiership at the back end. I’ve been around for a while now, played over 200 games, so that’s all I want to do. That’s the last thing I need to do is to have a good finals series, and hopefully we can get there.”
That hunger has been a quiet driving force for the forward throughout his career. “It’s definitely a motivation. Some years are very trying and you’re not winning a lot of games, so by the end of the year you sort of want a break. But when you’re in a good team, all you want to do is keep playing, play finals games, and obviously the ultimate goal at the end of the day is the premiership. That’s what we want to achieve. It’s probably not a spoken-about thing, but I think a few teammates might know. It adds to my motivation that all I want to do is play finals footy.”
This season, the dream was almost derailed by a sudden, severe health scare. A nasty strain of influenza A forced Aitken out of two matches, left him bedridden for 10 days with nine straight days of fever and full-body aches, and caused him to drop four kilograms unexpectedly. “There’s no treatment for influenza A or anything like that,” he said. “You get a bit of cabin fever as well because there’s not much you can really do besides wait it out. It wasn’t a great time.”
Rabbitohs coach Wayne Bennett even gave Aitken special permission to indulge in calorie-dense foods like pizza and pies to speed up his weight regain, a plan the forward balanced with nutrient-dense whole foods to avoid dropping too much fitness ahead of a crucial run of matches. “I was a bit nervous coming into the game last week because I still hadn’t put the weight back on, but I probably got on the field a bit earlier than I expected with Adam Elliott going down,” Aitken said. To his surprise, he held up well, helping the Rabbitohs secure a critical win over the Canterbury Bulldogs — the same side that eliminated him from the finals in his only post-season appearance to date.
“It was good to get out there, and I felt a lot better than I actually expected. To come away with the win topped off a good night,” he added. With the finish line in sight, Aitken is now just weeks away from closing the book on one of the NRL’s most unwanted long-term records.