Raiders prop Joe Tapine said Guler had been training the house down during the pre-season and was one of a number of young forwards stepping up to help cover the losses of Adam Elliott (Newcastle) and Ryan Sutton (Canterbury).

Guler has 57 NRL games under his belt, with 16 of those coming last season.

He dropped out of the 17 after round six, but forced his way back into the side in the Green Machine's run to the second week of the 2022 finals.

Tapine predicted the 25-year-old was in line for an expanded role in 2023 to help cover the loss of Elliott's energy in attack.

The Raiders wanted to keep Elliott, but he switched to the Knights after getting his NRL career back on track in Canberra.

Tapine said young forwards Trey Mooney and Ata Mariota had also impressed him during pre-season.

"You see a lot of young fellas coming in - Trey's been training really well, Ata, all the young fellas are going well," Tapine said.

"Emre's been training the house down.

"Coming back late and seeing what he's doing in the gym and on the field and the wrestle mat - I reckon he's in for a big season so I'm looking forward to seeing what he does."

Both Mooney and Mariota made their NRL debuts last year, playing just the one game for the season.

Tapine expected that experience would stand them in good stead for this year.

"Huge. I think in the NRL when you've got a bit of experience behind you it helps just that confidence that you have that ability to play at that level, which all of them do," he said.

"They've just got to tweak little parts of their game, like talk and that. They'll be right."

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Last year it was the young outside backs who stepped up.

Xavier Savage, Matt Timoko, Sebastian Kris, James Schiller and Albert Hopoate all either established themselves as NRL players or showed they had a future as one.

They helped cover injuries to 292-game veteran Jarrod Croker (shoulder), fullback Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad (hamstring) and Harley Smith-Shields (knee).

This year a similar responsibility falls to the young forwards following Elliott's and Sutton's departures.

The Raiders also have Pasami Saulo, who they recruited from the Knights, Peter Hola and Clay Webb as middle options.

Hola impressed in his first season in Canberra.

While the 23-year-old didn't make his Raiders debut, he was named their NSW Cup player of the year.

Versatile Raiders forward Corey Harawira-Naera said it was crucial the young guns took their game to the next level.

"We need to. There's a lot of onus always on the leaders, but there's gaps where we've lost players from last year that have the potential of having the young boys step in and demand to be selected and there's opportunities there with the losses of guys like Sutto and Adsy, especially through the middle," he said.

"So it's given guys like Trey Mooney an opportunity, Ata Mariota, even just like Emre and that to get a few more minutes.

"It's going to be interesting to see how it plays out the first few rounds, but everyone down there is pretty confident in our pre-season heading into the season."

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