With a full pre-season under their belts, Raiders halves pairing Blake Austin and Aidan Sezer are ready to make their mark on the NRL in 2017.
Austin had a horror run with injuries, limiting the time he and Sezer were able to spend together at training and in matches in their first year as the club's first-choice halves.
Now with an uninterrupted lead up to the season, they are ready to unleash a more developed combination as Canberra pushes for its first title since 1994.
"With the lack of time we spent on the paddock last pre-season other guys were filling in and I guess they were hearing less instructions from us," Austin said.
"We've been able to stamp our mark on the team.
"We're going to be able to really control things and really chime in."
Having a strong voice in the group has been a focus for the duo, with Austin confident the duo have made a positive contribution in the pre-season.
"We've got a team where we don't need to have our hands on the ball as much as some of the other halves in the competition," Austin said.
"In saying that we certainly want to have more of a mark on this team. We really want to own the team.
"That's something we've worked really hard on and our forwards and our backs have responded really well to that."
While the Raiders were enjoying success Austin was forced to watch on in one of the toughest seasons of his career.
"Every time I found a bit of momentum it was halted again," he said of 2016.
"As a guy that focuses a lot of his game on his running game, if your body is not 100 per cent then it's going to suffer."
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