Who would want to be an NRL halfback?
Every loss suffered by your team is going to be lumped on you, regardless of how well you played.
Win a game? Yeah ok, that's your job. Lose a game? Hopeless.
We are in a golden age of elite halfbacks right now. You'll notice the teams who don't feature here, shockingly, also didn't have great seasons overall.
Pretty simply stuff: halfback good = team good!
Today we are going to try and rank the best halfbacks from the 2025 season. This always goes well.
As usual, this is ranked purely on 2025 performance and isn't necessarily just a best halfbacks in the game list.
If you're looking for Tom Dearden, we ran him in the five-eighths rankings a few days ago.
Below are the Top 10 halfbacks from the 2025 season:
9. Mitchell Moses
The second straight halfback who missed the majority of the season. Moses played 13 times for the Eels and once for the Blues.
His 13 games produced six tries, eight try assists, eight line-break assists, four forced dropouts, three line-breaks, 545 kick metres per game and 75 run metres per game. Defensively, he made 83% tackles.
He was absolutely magnificent in Origin One and I have no doubt his absence cost the Blues in Games Two and Three.
Moses can feel a little hard done by in being overlooked for a Kangaroos game on the Ashes tour. Eels and Blues fans won't mind though as they just want him to get through unscathed.
For me, Cleary was best o er the season, and Metcalf best for the games he played.
(Remember, halves always look good when their forwards are going forward, so I think Metcalf had to do more / play better, to be as good as he was.)