Following on from last week’s mid-season advanced statistic leaders, I thought being halfway through the season it would be a good time to have a look at discipline statistics league wide. Thankfully we’re on the other side of the early season high shot crackdown so things are relatively back to...
www.rugbyleagueeyetest.com
The stats say (admittedly 4 weeks old) that we are net positive in both penalties and repeat sets. It’s not the refs stopping us from winning.
The argument that the “good” teams get the rub of the green and the “shit” teams are hammered because “corruption” is non factual also. The better teams generally give away more penalties and repeat sets than the shit teams. They are good enough to win anyway.
We as Parra fans have massive blue and gold coloured glasses. We love to blame a ref.
Don’t get me started on the commentators. They are also not against us. It’s painful to read the same dribble every week, generally from the same people.
We are simply not very good right now. We show glimpses but not for long enough. We are getting better though.
Although I agree that we make too many dumb mistakes in possession to "deserve" winning games that does not negate what is a clear bias by the referees against Parramatta. What causes that bias is debatable but what is
not debatable is the evidence of that bias.
I've already cited the penalty last week by Peter Gough of JAC for incorrect play the ball and the non-penalty by the same Peter Gough for exactly the same infringement by Matthew Eisenhuth that led to a try.
The penalty against JAC was a huge momentum swing because not only were we 10-4 up we were in possession, which, as you would know penalties in possession are coach killers for being the dumbest of dumb. That was 8 points gifted to the 4 peat Panthers in a game they won by 8 points.
Just because we drop the ball or throw a misdirected pass out of panic doesn't let the ref get off scot-free for what are clearly biased decisions that have re-directed momentum from the Eels to the opposition.
What really grinds my gears about that incorrect play the ball penalty against JAC is not just because we were in possession 20 metres out on our 2nd, or that it's a nit picking technical penalty whereas glaring forward passes or head highs go undetected, or that the crack down on this technicality had already occurred for the first 3 rounds and then just as suddenly disappeared till now, it was the
irony that we were being penalised for an infringement that the Panthers had mastered in their run to their 4th grand final victory in 2024.
The crackdown on incorrect play the ball came about due to that infamous Panthers come from behind victory 34-36 against us in round 23 last year.
If Alanis Morissette were to re-write her song with actual examples of irony the penalty by Gough would be a classic.
An Eel got penalised for incorrect play the ball
Against the team that mastered the art which caused a ref crackdown
It's a Josh Addo-Carr millimetre piece of boot leather on the sideline
While the painted on eyes touchie can't see metres forwards passes
And isn't it ironic?
Don't you think?
Remember that JAC possible boot on the sideline disallowed try against the Dragons? Knowing how deaf dumb and blind the touchies are to forward passes against us, like Starling's several yesterday, yet they could detect a millimetre of JAC boot onto a possible spillage by whoever painted the sideline, how can you even doubt they have a bias against us?
The evidence each week is overwhelming.
A Melbourne Scum mate of mine was praising Harry Grant to me the other day about what a genius player he is and I had to pull him up with this correction: There is zero chance that if Harry Grant played for the Eels he would get away with the bullshit stunts he pulls week in and week out in the ruck.
I seriously think that the only reason the NRL won't bring in forward pass technology is because the Scum would never win a game again and if we ran the technology over their seasons under Bellamy every premiership would be stripped. Because Bellamyball relies upon a short forward pass to a player in an off side position. Yet if Eels did that, not a chance they're getting away with it.
Which is why Bellamy will never be considered among the great coaches because he's never had to coach a non-Scum team with the NRL's thumb on the refereeing scale.
End of rant.
