Sorry this is late. Wrote like half of this down then accident deleted it..
Next week will be the good guide given it will be the same bench role.
Defence he was good. Won't be needed to make 35 tackles or won't get long minutes though.
I haven't watched the replay but at the ground. Henry was great off less minutes and good numbers both sides of the ball.
Hopgood started against their best pack. Things are a little different running and tackling guys who good enough to be coming off that Sharks bench fighting for spots in their 17 compared to players definitely playing reggies and u/21's boys. Braden Hamlin-Uele was their best forward as you'd expect and he came off after 20 when it the score was 0-0, Talakai was probably their second best when on and he came off soon after for a HIA then we ran way with it. Liam Henry's probably above their some of their reggies and u/20s boys but let's see how he goes when he's a starting forward in Cup consistently. That 7/10 consistency is what the main thing players need in first grade bar genetic freaks of the game and Hopgood plays like that.
In terms of impact with props off the bench in a vacuum I thought Bradley Fearnley had the most impact tbh, even if he probably played longer against worse players. It felt like he bringing the most direct impact.
We are likely talking about the 4th bench game. So very limited minutes you want the player who makes the best impact per minute.
That is where things like penalties conceded, errors, metres per run come into.
I'll rewatch it but I think his one error was just a guy hitting him in the perfect spot to hit the ball, can't do anything about that. These things happen, errors get forced by good teams and good tackling. It's the unforced errors that coaches really have a problem with. I mean I'm sure Tago made 2 but no one cares because it's Tago. I think his other one was due to a bad pass that Falls that needed to be a little more accurate and softer.
On Metres gained alone.
Henry and Geyer are jersey players had more metres than Hopgood
It's different positions. You can't compare running metres to a lock forward doing some ball playing to a prop/second rower running out the back or off that ball playing. And especially for second row. Guyer was running at a small half who defended poorly. It's much, much easier running at halves in comparison to the middle and the gap narrows against the good team. He's not going to easily brush off a feeble Jarome Hughes tackle and run 24 metres to score against a team like the Storm.
The lock forward's thing is to naturally lock up the middle of the defence to a bit more tackling and passing and a bit less running. Guys like Taumuolo are just props that play at lock. And coming on and tackling his heart out in the middle means Api will have to do less which means he'll have more gas in the tank. You can look at the reverse in how much creativity has gone Jake Trobivich's game now that Api's gone and his hooker's work rate isn't that great compared to others which leaves more defensive work for him.
Also from what I remembered watching him Henry(?) struggled forward for post contact metres whereas Hopgood didn't bother with that and and just found his front straight away to play the ball as quick as possible for his team mates on the next tackle like JFH does with all of his runs.
As did Susino who is a Ron Massey Cup player
Not only did those 3 gain more metres.
All had a tackle bust to Hopgood's 0
And had an error each
If you get absolutely pumped by one guy and another dude lands on you it's a tackle bust. If a prop has a fair couple I'd take notice that there's something there but one is too small a sample size to sound like a difference in of itself without watching it to see what he did specifically.
I think in this post you're underestimating winning the ruck in defence in relation to metres conceded. If you put in an awesome kick chase and trap a guy on his 18 and belt him near the corner and slow the ptb down like Hopgood did to the FB. They're probably making 30 more metres on that set without taking risks. If someone normal does it and just forms a line at the 24th metre mark, nearer to the middle of the field and makes a normal tackle that's not terrible but is a serviceable play the ball it's a massive difference in metres conceded.
