The Decision Making Issue

[DJDL]

I've spoken about this before, but I really question our decision making and leadership.

Two things last night, IMHO, turned the game on it's head.

Ask yourself this:

Number 1.

You're a leader of your team. You are absolutely caning the opposition in defence, and look well on the way to springing an upset. But you've conceded a try on the back of a questionable refereeing decision and now trail by 2 with 30 minutes left to play.

You have your troops behind the posts as the opposition line up the conversion. What would you be saying? Would you be telling them to get it out of their heads? The decision has been made, live with it. We're all over them. Kick deep into their territory and let's bash the merkins again. We'll get plenty more opportunity. It's only 2 points behind and not time for panic stations.

Or do you speak of going for the low-percentage play. The short kick off.

Yep, let's try that. Concede a penalty in the process. Then a second try and all off a sudden we're 8 behind, kicking back to them and, next thing you know, we haven't seen the ball for 10 minutes.

Number 2.
This happened earlier, but I believe the first to be the bigger error in judgement and to have had the greater impact on the result.

It's 2 minutes to half time. You're up by 8 points, inside the opposition 40 on the last. You've got numbers to the left and head that way. You engage the line and look to be poking your head through. Do you go yourself, and hope to pop an offload to the player on your left shoulder? Or do you throw what is clearly never going to be anything but an intercept?

Or do you just play the percentages, rolling it down into the corner and make the opposition work it off their line like you have for the past 38 minutes?

We all know how that ended.

Seriously, our decision making at crucial times is nothing short of diabolical and it comes from our leaders time and time again.
Ice those two decisions and we are still in the hunt. But, as we saw, they pretty much ended our night.

Honestly, I'm so far off Wade Graham it's not funny.

 

[Griffoshark66]

Great post. Wade has offered very little this year. I can't see how he plays SOO in a few weeks.

 

[SharkShocked]

I put the same thing out on twitter mid way through that second half.

They were the two key incidents in the game and they were entirely on us. Had nothing to do with refereeing or 50/50 calls.

The first one, the short kick off (which looked intentional) I heard Morris refer to in the press conference as 'Duges scuffing the restart'.... to me it looked like an intentional short kick off.

If that was definitely intentional, it really did give a clear indication as to the teams lack of maturity and mental toughness... they'd just had a controversial call go against them, half of them blowing up... so instead of getting into the grind only 2 points down and continuing to do what had worked for them all game, we go on massive tilt and look for cheap possession.

The Graham pass was also a shocker, total control everything going our way and changed the game in an instant, the momentum shift was diabolical. All we needed to do was get to half time with that lead in tact and reset and go again, instead we were looking for the shortcut as we have done all year.

I'm personally a Bomber fan, I think he's done quite well given the circumstances over the last two years and some of the youth have come through under him are really promising...However, I've never seen a Craig Bellamy or Trent Robinson coached team look for the shortcuts we did last night and that's concerning.

 

[MilkShark]

Said it before and I’ll say it again, make SJ captain

 

[Version IV]

Said it before and I’ll say it again, make SJ captain

I agree and next in line Brailey as we need him long term

 

[Frenzy.]

How many of the mean girls are left?

Do they still wield power?

If so Wade won't be relieved

 

[Version IV]

Have you ever noticed how long it takes Chad to make up mind when a penalty be is given, no quick tap the play stops deaf

 

[MilkShark]

I agree and next in line Brailey as we need him long term

Yep, me personally, I see Brailey as our long term captain

 

[Tiger Shark]

Not sure Brailey is captain material. Pretty quietly spoken guy. Might come out of his shell more in following seasons.

If Teig kicks on I see him as captain material but won’t be for a while. Has captained all junior and rep teams

 

[MilkShark]

Not sure Brailey is captain material. Pretty quietly spoken guy. Might come out of his shell more in following seasons.

If Teig kicks on I see him as captain material but won’t be for a while. Has captained all junior and rep teams

Yep he is quiet, that’s the only thing that might hold him back. I don’t know much about teig but from what I have seen, he is a long long long way off

 

[Weaponhead]

Being a good captain is about respect. The players need to respect and follow the Captain. As a rookie, most will be reserved to an extent as they earn their place. He doesn't have to be loud just command respect.

He will be quality.

 

[jc155776]

To me the decision to take the tap just as our hooker is taken off and busted was a bizarre decision. We looked f**king awful with no hooker guiding the team inside the 20. Take the 2, up by ten, grind a set up the field to get some groove with the replacement hooker, kill some time. 8 to 10 IS a big difference, When the points are gimme freebies. Canberra would Need have to convert two tries to go ahead.

 

[snout]

What we are seeing is no accountability.
Ever hear the storm explain how on video day the video is paused and you have to stand and explain to the group your f**kup.

Ever wonder how and why a team finishes in the top 4 every year. Senior players set the standard, model it and enforce it.

That right there is the flipside to what we see at the sharks. The video session would run for 4 days as chad and his mates explained their uncountable collection of mistakes.

Ronaldos hands.
Wades monty python routine.
Chads misadventures.
Woods self preservation.
Feefs standup comedy.
And so on..
The same mistakes by the same players every single week.

Professional athletes my arse.
Yep. Wade is not a captain.

 

[Version IV]

What we are sewing is no accountability.
Ever hear the storm explain how on video day the video is paused and you have to stand and explain to the group your f**kup.

Ever wonder how and why a team finishes in the top 4 every year. Senior players set the standard, model it and enforce it.

That right there is the flipside to what we see at the sharks. The video session would run for 4 days as chad and his mates explained their uncountable collection of mistakes.

Ronaldos hands.
Wades monty python routine.
Chads misadventures.
Woods self preservation.
Feefs standup comedy.
And so on..
The same mistakes by the same players eveey single week.

Professional athletes my arse.
Yep. Wade is not a captain.

There is a reality show there they could sell to Netflix

 

[AJB1102]

What we are seeing is no accountability.
Ever hear the storm explain how on video day the video is paused and you have to stand and explain to the group your f**kup.

Ever wonder how and why a team finishes in the top 4 every year. Senior players set the standard, model it and enforce it.

That right there is the flipside to what we see at the sharks. The video session would run for 4 days as chad and his mates explained their uncountable collection of mistakes.

Ronaldos hands.
Wades monty python routine.
Chads misadventures.
Woods self preservation.
Feefs standup comedy.
And so on..
The same mistakes by the same players every single week.

Professional athletes my arse.
Yep. Wade is not a captain.

Assuming from this you've sat in on a few vid sessions?

 

[Feej 2: Electric Boogaloo]

How many of the mean girls are left?

Do they still wield power?

If so Wade won't be relieved

 

[Frailty]

The team this season has never responded well to things not go their way. Any instance of pressure and they tend to crumble. Part of that is inexperience, but it's the senior players than need to step up at those times and they simply haven't.

Wade - He has been bad this season. He has shown glimpses of his skill, but the majority of the season he has had little impact and his defence been absolutely questionable. He has learnt the whiney captain approach from Gallen - but referees never respond to this. He needs to lead the team, and if this season is any indication his leadership is whiny, panicky, and immature.

Townsend - I thought he had one of his better games against Canberra, but he is simply not good enough. His kicking game was gross (a grubber to the in-goal would have been nice during the second half).

Woods - He has good games, and then there is the game on the weekend. He offered no impact/go forward with the ball, zero offloads, no quick play the balls. He offered nothing, and I found myself waiting for Rudolf to get back on the field.

Wade needs a big bounce back season in 2021 and hopefully missing out on Origin will be the kick in the ass he needs.

As for Townsend, hopefully the Bulldogs interest is real.

 

[txta2]

Wade ain't in SOO

 

[Frenzy.]

The team this season has never responded well to things not go their way. Any instance of pressure and they tend to crumble. Part of that is inexperience, but it's the senior players than need to step up at those times and they simply haven't.

Wade - He has been bad this season. He has shown glimpses of his skill, but the majority of the season he has had little impact and his defence been absolutely questionable. He has learnt the whiney captain approach from Gallen - but referees never respond to this. He needs to lead the team, and if this season is any indication his leadership is whiny, panicky, and immature.

Townsend - I thought he had one of his better games against Canberra, but he is simply not good enough. His kicking game was gross (a grubber to the in-goal would have been nice during the second half).

Woods - He has good games, and then there is the game on the weekend.

He offered no impact/go forward with the ball.
Rubbish. 14 hitups (2nd highest) for 135 metres (4th highest) for 51 post contact metres (4th highest)

zero offloads,
Correct

no quick play the balls.
Bullshyte. Average PTB speed was 3.19 seconds the fastest of any Sharks forward. Again. he does it week in and week out. No errors

He offered nothing, and I found myself waiting for Rudolf to get back on the field.
He didn't do better than Woods in any stat.
11 hitups, 116 metres, 40 PCMs, no offloads, PTB speed 3.4 seconds. 2 errors

Wade needs a big bounce back season in 2021 and hopefully missing out on Origin will be the kick in the ass he needs.

As for Townsend, hopefully the Bulldogs interest is real.

Not like you to hop on the bandwagon of the vox populi in here Frailty. Woods was good in the semi.

 

[Frailty]

Not like you to hop on the bandwagon of the vox populi in here Frailty. Woods was good in the semi.

Ok let's look at some math:

Woods - 14 HUs for 135m = 9.64m/run. Of this 3.64m was post contact.
Rudolf - 11 Hus for 116m = 10.55m/run. Of this 3.63m was post contact.

So in other words, Rudolf was making more metres, and relying less on post-contact metres. On top of that, he also started the game where the defence was fresher.

In regards to play the ball speed, the timing is based on when a tackle is complete or called held. A lot of the time, Woods is standing still held by defenders which allows for a quicker play the ball speed, but not in an advantageous position where a defensive line isn't set.

How often on the game did Woods have a quick play the ball where it caught the defence on the back foot?