Canberra Raiders back-rower Elliott Whitehead relishing life outside NRL bubble

Even if the Canberra Raiders back-rower knows about the time Kearns came off a horse during an ill-fated NSW State of Origin bonding session in 1999, in turn busting his shoulder and missing 12 weeks of football, it probably wasn't going to stop Whitehead jumping on one this week.

What would you do if you'd been stuck at home for the best part of two months and the isolation bubble finally bursts?

Whitehead and Jack Wighton went horse riding after the NRL eased restrictions on players - and thankfully avoided the fate suffered by Kearns.

"We've been stuck at home for quite a while now, nearly two months. A few of us got out on Monday and played a bit of golf," Whitehead said.

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"Me and Jack went horse riding, something a little bit different. I haven't been on a horse for 20 years so it was a bit scary at the start.

"It was good to do something different and get out of the house. The boys will be looking to do some activities like that.

"We just went for an hour and a half up the hills. My horse didn't listen to me at times, but it was good fun. We'll probably do it a bit more often now, Jack is looking into buying a horse so I might have to join him."

But first comes a clash with one of the league's most potent second-phase play threats in the Parramatta Eels at Western Sydney Stadium on Saturday night.

Whitehead has his work cut out for him as he braces for a battle with Ryan Matterson on the edge, who leads the league in offloads with 18. Sitting behind him is Junior Paulo with 17.

"They've been great at it this year, with their offloads. They've got Junior and [Reagan] Campbell-Gillard in the middle that like to offload and obviously Matterson on the edge as well," Whitehead said.

"It'll be big for us, making sure we stop that second phase play and hopefully we can do that and play a little bit ourselves as well."

NRL ROUND SEVEN

Saturday: Canberra Raiders v Parramatta Eels at Western Sydney Stadium, 7.35pm.

Raiders squad: 1. Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad, 2. Jordan Rapana, 3. Jarrod Croker (c), 4. Curtis Scott, 5. Nick Cotric, 6. Jack Wighton, 7. George Williams, 8. Josh Papalii, 9. Josh Hodgson (c), 10. Sia Soliola, 11. Joe Tapine, 12. Elliott Whitehead, 13. Corey Horsburgh. Interchange: 14. Siliva Havili, 15. Emre Guler, 16. Ryan Sutton, 17. Hudson Young. Reserves: 18. Bailey Simonsson, 19. Dunamis Lui, 20. Matt Frawley, 21. Tom Starling.

Eels squad: 1. Clinton Gutherson, 2. Maika Sivo, 3. Michael Jennings, 4. Waqa Blake, 5. Blake Ferguson, 6. Dylan Brown, 7. Mitchell Moses, 8. Reagan Campbell-Gillard, 9. Reed Mahoney, 10. Junior Paulo, 11. Shaun Lane, 12. Ryan Matterson, 13. Nathan Brown. Interchange: 14. Ray Stone, 15. Marata Niukore, 16. Oregon Kaufusi, 17. Brad Takairangi. Reserves: 18. David Gower, 19. Daniel Alvaro, 20. George Jennings, 21. Jai Field.