'11 | R10 | Fri | Bulldogs 10-15 Dragons | ANZ

[BM1979]

The Dogs just need to improve their starts against the Dragons , it appears as though their playing scared and then once they are behind they have no choice to come out and play football, was really impressed with Pritchard tonight and I really dont know why Eastwood is playing , he is obviously not fit yet.

Did he comeback through the NSW cup or straight into first grade

 

[MatthewA]

A great game, no doubt about it. Game of the year so far.

It showed both sides should feature deep into the finals. The Dragons continue to do what they do while the Bulldogs are slowly starting to hit their straps. The second half tonight showed that.

I won't harp on about how poor the officialdom was yet again, I'll just focus on the great match.

Well done to both sides.

 

[MatthewA]

The Dogs just need to improve their starts against the Dragons , it appears as though their playing scared and then once they are behind they have no choice to come out and play football, was really impressed with Pritchard tonight and I really dont know why Eastwood is playing , he is obviously not fit yet.

Did he comeback through the NSW cup or straight into first grade

Straight into first grade. And you're right, he is far from match fit. But I don't think NSW Cup will do much for him. He needs to be in first grade. He isn't dreadful at the moment, but he isn't going that well. He'll keep improving every week.

 

[cleary89]

Are you for real? They won the game, they are 9-1, they had players playing rep football backing up.

Still not sure of the point you are trying to make.

Come on mate. Dragons tonight let in 2 (two) tries. Worst defense in the comp! Nobody lets in two tries!

 

[BM1979]

Come on mate. Dragons tonight let in 2 (two) tries. Worst defense in the comp! Nobody lets in two tries!

Two tries in 40 minutes , for the Dragons that resembles the Dam falling apart , geez dont all teams wish they could think like that.

 

[cleary89]

Dogs in possession, touched by the opposition, tackle count restarted.

Isn't that the point of the zero tackle rule? Rather than packing a scrum when the opposition has touched on the ball, they say its the zero tackle.

Do we have a scrum when someone knocks it back? I don't know which bit he's talking about, but if it was indeed a not back as he said there would be no zero tackle.

 

[Charles Bronson]

Lmao !!! Go the dragons!!! Dogs are rubbish trying to hide idris the future immortal lol barba forst time the midget was tested under the high ball all season. If soward doesnt get picked for nsw stuart needs to kill himself.

 

[skeepe]

Yeah, they are terrible. It disappears frequently, or says 5th tackle when it's actually the 4th.

It was wrong every single set last week for both the test and City Country... on the 4th tackle it would briefly flash 4th and then tick over straight to 5th.

It's really not that hard to get something like that right... who does their graphics? I know Namadgi Systems do Fox but I don't know if they do Nein as well.. .perhaps they do it in-house? Whoever it is needs a massive boot up the arse.

 

[Timmah]

Solid, positive game for both sides, a true "tale of two halves". Happy we kept Saints scoreless in the second half - defence clicked and we got more ball which was good.

Tonight in my eyes showed we did enough to challenge the top teams. Hopefully the boys take their A game to Canberra next week as despite their form, they won't be easybeats.

 

[Moffo]

Cucking refs

 

[Timmah]

Some criticisms of our side I noticed...

Keating and Hodkinson would have to be among the worst halves/general play kickers for finding space off a kick. Most kicks either went right down the throat of Boyd, Morris or Nightingale - giving them valuable metres to start the set. In contrast, Soward and Hornby consistently had Turner and Barba having to turn around and chase. Was one of the key differences.

The other thing I've noticed is Ennis is very flat footed at DH. Maybe I'm just not observant enough but Young and Farah have a much more "go forward" style where they'll try some verstality out of DH - Ennis seems to plant his feet flat and direct the pass to first receiver like some sort of training drill - and as such it makes it hard to gain metres. Once players like Stagg and Halatau found themselves working the DH role a bit in the second half, I noticed we seemed to have better go forward and the support runners were there.

With a bit of tweaking, I can see us being a top four team - but we need to lift a bit more.

 

[Charles Bronson]

cucking refs

hahahahahahhahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[ByRd]

Our biggest problem and it has been all year is the speed of our defensive line, we are so slow moving forward and meeting the attackers and this is just letting the other side make 50-60 meters a set, tough to win games doing that. I'm happy with the effort in the second half and am not that disappointed, we proved we can match it with the best and hopefully we learn from this and can start playing for 80mins. That try to Prior was not a try imo but that's footy and that stuff happens, we had plenty of time to come back from it and almost did so proud of the boys and well played both sides, I hope we meet again later this year.

 

[saint_marto88]

Pritchard was great in the last 20. Wasn't sighed in the hour before that

 

[BM1979]

Some criticisms of our side I noticed...

Keating and Hodkinson would have to be among the worst halves/general play kickers for finding space off a kick. Most kicks either went right down the throat of Boyd, Morris or Nightingale - giving them valuable metres to start the set. In contrast, Soward and Hornby consistently had Turner and Barba having to turn around and chase. Was one of the key differences.

The other thing I've noticed is Ennis is very flat footed at DH. Maybe I'm just not observant enough but Young and Farah have a much more "go forward" style where they'll try some verstality out of DH - Ennis seems to plant his feet flat and direct the pass to first receiver like some sort of training drill - and as such it makes it hard to gain metres. Once players like Stagg and Halatau found themselves working the DH role a bit in the second half, I noticed we seemed to have better go forward and the support runners were there.

With a bit of tweaking, I can see us being a top four team - but we need to lift a bit more.

I cant believe we never tried a short kick , Boyd stands so Deep on last tackle , A chip for Barba was on half the night.

 

[Charles Bronson]

Pritchard was great in the last 20. Wasn't sighed in the hour before that

him and payne were fantastic for the dogs

 

[saint_marto88]

I think Pritchard could've offered more in the first hour.

 

[hybrid_tiger]

IMO a spine of Keating, Hodgkinson and Ennis will not be able to score enough points against the top sides. The Bulldogs have little variety or spark in attack besides Barba and believe it or not Corey Payne's offloads.

Keating tries hard and is a wholehearted player but he doesn't have a creative bone in his body, while Hodgkinson does have a good kicking game but rarely runs to the line or puts the defense in two minds. Ennis, well enough has already been said about him, flat and one dimensional at best.

 

[Berkeley_Eagle]

I still cant believe their first try was allowed

 

[Gaba]

I know what I saw. I saw a very beatable side. Imagine if that was Melbourne you were playing...

the storm last year only scored 2 trys and had thier best game before they got stripped of thier points and the dragons played poorly then last night

couldnt see storm doing much better then the bulldogs