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Tonite's game vs Sharks

Messages
14,937
What a low game of footy,(even allowing for the rain) the only postitive I can come up with, was we won,nothing else.
 
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liquor box

Juniors
Messages
58
Terrible performance, I am now doubting if we will even make the 8. Lucky we were plaing a very very poor team.

I think Lang missed a chance to make a statement to the team and pull Sandopw off the field when he put on the late shot on the Cronulla FB, he should have been binned and we cant affor these stupid plays. Pull him off the field and yell at him a bit...it might make him grow up a little and think of his team.

The highlight was definately Champion, he was a monster tonight and totally owned Gallen, his defence was great. I thought Taylor was great for half of his time on the park, but the other half of his time he was nothing special. Luke Stuart was again great. Isaac had a good game once he made it to the right ground:lol:

3 Champion
2 Stuart
1 Luke
 

hunters

Juniors
Messages
1,808
I think Lang missed a chance to make a statement to the team and pull Sandopw off the field when he put on the late shot on the Cronulla FB,
Yeah it was a dumb but at least he was showing some sort of passion or excitement (plus I'm sure it was just a timing thing). Sutton looked completely disinterested in the last 15 and this is a lot worse IMHO.

Agree with your ratings, though I'd go Luke, Champs, Stuart.
 

Sugar

Bench
Messages
4,133
No celebrating here

Woeful second half Vs useless opposition (sorry sharks but geez)
Not repeat sets
Selfish players
stupid mistakes
dumb penalties

we need a massive tune up before the Dogs we should have put 60 on the sharks but the halves looked lost.
Sandow is a selfish player who needs to get his sh*t together.
The 2 points is great but means nothing if we don't improve for next week
 

Dogmatix

Juniors
Messages
505
Sandow does less and less with each game. Ran for 8 metres tonight on the early stats which give him a grand total of 15 metres run in 3 games this season. You might as well raffle off the No 7 jersey to a different Souths supporter each week

If Cronulla had a more experienced fullback it would have been a close game
 

Shadlow!

Juniors
Messages
2
can eddie pea play or is he just with norths?? lets give him a shot, i doubt he could do much worse... get a 7 year old from the crowd to play.. he'd be taller :p haha
 

KKW

Juniors
Messages
156
what happened to all the ..........."were top 4 specials this year" stuff.
 

Bumble

First Grade
Messages
7,995
what happened to all the ..........."were top 4 specials this year" stuff.

A long way to go yet...and I don't remember anyone of us saying such outlandish things - it mostly came from the media. I'd be more concerned with your mob not coming last, now the Brett Stewart is gone :)

Anyway...terrible 2nd half last night. We had enough opportunities to score 50-60 points, but I guess we just need to be happy to get the 2 points...and the best part is the crowd for next monday just went up a few thousand because we won :lol:
 
Messages
15,545
Rather win a crappy game than lose a brilliant game tbh.

Clearly, we are still taking some time to hit our straps. It will come, we just need to be patient. Any win we can sneak in the meantime is a major plus.
 

KKW

Juniors
Messages
156
A long way to go yet...and I don't remember anyone of us saying such outlandish things - it mostly came from the media. I'd be more concerned with your mob not coming last, now the Brett Stewart is gone :)

If Someone were to go though the posts on here I bet there'd be a stack saying something along the lines of top 4 certs. Players, fans and media were hyping it up.

As for Stewart. He hardly played last year and they still made top 5 and nearly top 4. Manly are re-building and probably won't make the semis this year. At least I'm realistic. Nothing to do with Stewart not playing.

I watched the game on tv last night and the way souths played they won't make the 8 either. They'll win a few games but don't look like the sort of team that is consistent. Anywhere from 9th to 13th for them. There's too many other better footy teams out there.
 

Ike E Bear

Juniors
Messages
1,998
Terrible performance, I am now doubting if we will even make the 8. Lucky we were plaing a very very poor team.

I think Lang missed a chance to make a statement to the team and pull Sandopw off the field when he put on the late shot on the Cronulla FB, he should have been binned and we cant affor these stupid plays. Pull him off the field and yell at him a bit...it might make him grow up a little and think of his team.

The highlight was definately Champion, he was a monster tonight and totally owned Gallen, his defence was great. I thought Taylor was great for half of his time on the park, but the other half of his time he was nothing special. Luke Stuart was again great. Isaac had a good game once he made it to the right ground:lol:

3 Champion
2 Stuart
1 Luke

While last night's performace wasn't particularly impressive against an ailing opponent, I actually think there were some significant improvements in a number of areas. It's also worth noting that, even when the Sharks were the first to score, there was never a time when it seemed the Bunnies wouldn't win (at least to me). The game was always under control ... even if they didn't deliver a decisive killing blow.

1 - The kicking game improved substantially, and more importantly kicking was done far more intelligently. I think anyone who was watching the Roosters game would have been boggling over the fact that the Rabbitohs seemed dead against bombing Carney. While not every kick last night was a winner, they were generally "the right" kicks.

2 - Interchange was handled far more strategically. I don't know what else to say about that, except to say that I think Lang's benching strategy in round two really significantly contribute to the lose. Glad to see he didn't repeat the error ... hopefully that wasn't just because of the injury to Tyrrell (geeze he impressed me again). Taylor played almost 70 minutes, Burgess over an hour and Asotasi and Stuart over 50 minutes each. When they did come on, all of the bench players - except maybe Clark - had an impact. Geddes and McPherson were great, while Tyrrell was having a ripper before Ferguson's elbow accidentally smashed his face in.

3 - Defence up front was a lot stronger and the hits were being felt. Especially against a tough forward pack like Cronulla's, this was a chance for the Rabbitohs to justify some of the hype. The actual defensive structure got caught out a couple of times, but Souths did a great job of targetting and shutting down Barrett and Gallen (Tupou was mostly taken out by Collis' injury and being stranded in the centres), which didn't leave them with much strike power. I thought that latter part was a very good tactic.

4 - Isaac Luke's personal form is on the rise. This is very good. As long as the kicking game isn't woeful and the backline doesn't fluff too many tries by getting over-excited, then Luke will get the big forwards rolling and choas (the good kind) will ensue.

5 - Granted it fell away badly in the second half, but ball control was excellent in the first half. This was especially impressive because the Bunnies were still using the ball in the wet conditions, but were hanging onto it.


The remaining concerns are discipline, both in defence (penalties) and with the ball (perhaps patience or focus would be a better way to put it); and organisation. These factors were what cost the Bunnies a much bigger win.

If they continue improving, however, and don't backslide, then I honestly believe last night's performance was a good sign for the future.
 

MattJ

Juniors
Messages
1,367
So far we have seen improvement from week to week, we may not be playing at level at the moment that will let us compete with the likes of the Storm or Dragons, however, if we can keep notching up wins and building throughout the season, we have a side that could do something pretty significant by peaking at the right time of the year.

Thank you for actually outlining some positives Ike, we were never in any danger of losing that game, our line defence looked much better, Champion had a blinder and repeatedly smashed Gallen all night, Wesser had his best game back... etc.. There was some good stuff to come out of that game.

We are not world beaters yet, but have some faith, have some patience and wait and see what happens. the dogs looked ordinary in the 1st 2 rounds and exploded last week, you never know... a bit of cohesion from our halves and we might be the ones to explode next.
 

Ike E Bear

Juniors
Messages
1,998
No worries.

It seemed the prevailing opinions were a bit emo after the win.

Granted there's no reason to be overly positive, even after a win, if there's still a lot of work to do ... but I think last night was a step forward and should be acknowledged as such.

If the go backwards in coming weeks, then I'll be reaching for the razors the same as everyone else. For now, I'm willing to be happy (especially since the Eels didn't give me much to smile about this week).
 
Messages
15,545
Before you get too down in the mouth about our chances for the year, based on last nights performance, I ask you to think about this....

Does any team ever look good when they are playing the Sharks??

They may not have won a game for a while, but they sure do know how to turn a game of footy into a boring grind fest. I think its because they have such a high quality forward pack, mixed with such a boring halves combo and backline. The outside backs that they have are fairly good at closing things down so you basically end up with a grind fest. The only way you generally see tries against them are from errors or close to the line.
 

Bumble

First Grade
Messages
7,995
If Someone were to go though the posts on here I bet there'd be a stack saying something along the lines of top 4 certs. Players, fans and media were hyping it up.

As for Stewart. He hardly played last year and they still made top 5 and nearly top 4. Manly are re-building and probably won't make the semis this year. At least I'm realistic. Nothing to do with Stewart not playing.

I watched the game on tv last night and the way souths played they won't make the 8 either. They'll win a few games but don't look like the sort of team that is consistent. Anywhere from 9th to 13th for them. There's too many other better footy teams out there.

Fair enough. You also had Orford last year, though - Although Hodkinson looks half-decent.

This year I was fairly confident we'd make the 8, as I'm sure most Souths fans were. I don't think that was too lofty a prediction given the quality of our team on paper, and having John Lang as a coach. We've looked decidedly average yes, but as someone already mentioned so did the Bulldogs until they woke up last week and snapped the Roosters in half.

We need to improve to make the finals, and I think we will...as for Top 4? Given the last 20 years of this football club, I don't think any fans were expecting that :lol:
 

rabs

Moderator
Staff member
Messages
3,343
5 - Granted it fell away badly in the second half, but ball control was excellent in the first half. This was especially impressive because the Bunnies were still using the ball in the wet conditions, but were hanging onto it.

that's my positive from this game

As a negative still no creativity in attack, not enough happening off the ball. I guess the team will keep improving so happy if we are on fire at the business end. Gee I hope Sandow finds his form but it looks less likely every week at the moment.
 

Ike E Bear

Juniors
Messages
1,998
Before you get too down in the mouth about our chances for the year, based on last nights performance, I ask you to think about this....

Does any team ever look good when they are playing the Sharks??

They may not have won a game for a while, but they sure do know how to turn a game of footy into a boring grind fest. I think its because they have such a high quality forward pack, mixed with such a boring halves combo and backline. The outside backs that they have are fairly good at closing things down so you basically end up with a grind fest. The only way you generally see tries against them are from errors or close to the line.

Excellent point.
 

Ziggy the God

First Grade
Messages
5,240
It is only Round 3, so lets see how we go over the next month to get a guage on where we can finish.

I too thought it was a poor display from us in the second half, and I am hoping that because we had the game sewed up that they took the easy option. Don't like that, but I can understand it.

In terms of Sandow's hit on their fullback, if someone did that to Wesser I would want them binned. It was not like he was a split second out.
 

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