Charity Shield 2024

[Illusion]

Let's look at it this way , of our starting team and bench how many would be staters at other teams ..........? Anyone ?

 

[Rocket Rod]

Thought that last night was actually pretty promising. The first half the boys played with an intensity and desire that will win us more games than we lose. We definitely looked fitter, faster and stronger. Defence seems to have been the primary focus and it looked much better in the first half. Second half we played essentially our reserves so can’t take much stock in that.

I know a former first grade coach and he always told me that it only took a team a year to learn how to defend but 2-3 to learn how to attack properly. The key was for trusting your defence to win you games early on until your attack caught up. Flanagan coached teams in the past seem to have played this way previously. So I wouldn’t be surprised if we are a ruthless defensive team that wins games on the back of our defence.

Thought our standouts were Sua, F Molo, Bird and Marschke when he came on. Think Marschke needs to be our 14. The guy is electric.

With all due respect what game were you watching? The one I was we were rubbish. Sloan should be a figure skater not a footballer except for a couple the rest are just rubbish. If Mitchell Walker &Cook had’ve played the result would’ve been 50-6

 

[Illusion]

Can anyone tell me did Raymond Faitala-Mariner play last night ?

 

[Lovemedragons]

Thought that last night was actually pretty promising. The first half the boys played with an intensity and desire that will win us more games than we lose. We definitely looked fitter, faster and stronger. Defence seems to have been the primary focus and it looked much better in the first half. Second half we played essentially our reserves so can’t take much stock in that.

I know a former first grade coach and he always told me that it only took a team a year to learn how to defend but 2-3 to learn how to attack properly. The key was for trusting your defence to win you games early on until your attack caught up. Flanagan coached teams in the past seem to have played this way previously. So I wouldn’t be surprised if we are a ruthless defensive team that wins games on the back of our defence.

Thought our standouts were Sua, F Molo, Bird and Marschke when he came on. Think Marschke needs to be our 14. The guy is electric.

It was WB philosophy and it worked, get Defense right first and attack will come. Promising signs we won’t finish last perhaps.

 

[Como Connection]

Can anyone tell me did Raymond Faitala-Mariner play last night ?

No

 

[Rocket Rod]

Let's look at it this way , of our starting team and bench how many would be staters at other teams ..........? Anyone ?

Maybe Sua

 

[thebigredv]

Let's look at it this way , of our starting team and bench how many would be staters at other teams ..........? Anyone ?

Hunt, Lomax, Su’a, Lawrie and I reckon Ravalawa gets a gig at a couple other teams as well. Beyond that it looks like Eisenhuth will be a keeper and a starter for us, bench elsewhere.

I mean… how woeful is that.

it stuns me that some of the posters are only realising our lack of quality post the charity shield.

 

[Illusion]

Maybe Sua

Thinking the same .......

 

[Dragon David]

Can someone please explain to me like I’m a 12 year old. As far as I know every team has the same salary cap yes or no ? YES
Then how come SGI has a team of missfits?

They are all we can lure from the "vast" number of players in the NRL - just wait until there are 20 clubs in the NRL which bloody Albanese says he would like to see, then who can we get? Our team will consist mainly of the juniors we are developing and once players like Hunt, Bird, BMM, etc go, I can see a more formidable team playing for the RedV. We have to pay good money to get less than decent players because the better ones don't see us as a club really going places just yet.

I just want to see us playing a more entertaining brand of footy with plenty of tries being scored once our defence is more rock solid and then they can really work on the attack. Tries scored out wide by Braidon Burns type tries are what I would dearly like us working on. There was a time in the first half last night where our attack had formation when the players could all run together as one from a "V" shape and it nearly got us a try. They should do this more often.

If we can play for the full 80 minutes like we did in the first half but improve on it in the games ahead, then I can see us winning quite a few games - but again I say, get some attack going that will lead to more tries please. The more we can score the harder the opposing team will have in beating us which of course bloody obvious.

 

[OneEyedDragon]

I just thought your initial comment was kinda unnecessary.
We all know the refs are crap and seem to love to pull an obscure technical penalty out of their hat against the Dragons.
However, you can't watch that listless, clueless rubbish from the Red V last night and pretend that the ref was costing us. If you don't want to get penalised for for stuff like that learn the rules.
But if you have to take the piss out of someone to prove what a big boy you are, go for it.
Have a nice day.

Sorry you took it that way NOTB. I thought we were just having a bit of banter to overcome our mutual disappointment at the team's performance. I admit I would rather blame the ref than the team at this stage of the year as I try not to sink into depression until at least June.

 

[Willow]

 

[Murfy]

With all due respect what game were you watching? The one I was we were rubbish. Sloan should be a figure skater not a footballer except for a couple the rest are just rubbish. If Mitchell Walker &Cook had’ve played the result would’ve been 50-6

Both entitled to our own opinions. I just thought we were pretty good in the first half just lacked a little polish to finish off some attacking plays. First trial match there is always going to be some errors and lack of cohesion. Second half just shows that the majority of our young guys aren’t ready for first grade yet. Sloan is a work in progress, think we just have to accept that this season and hope Flanagan can turn him into a consistent first grader for next year. I see no point in talking about who wasn’t playing. If all their stars play maybe our boys rise up and play better? Can only play what’s in front of you

 

[Illusion]

With all due respect what game were you watching? The one I was we were rubbish. Sloan should be a figure skater not a footballer except for a couple the rest are just rubbish. If Mitchell Walker &Cook had’ve played the result would’ve been 50-6

As you say they had all those players out , said elsewhere Hunt being our play maker , and nothing changed last night everything went to him first, should have torn South's a new one , but still couldn't ....... And he still can't control a game .......

 

[R&WTILLIDIE]

Let’s hope the likes of Hunt, Sua, Eisenhuth, Sulli and Lomax stay injury free this season or else we will be further up shit creek.

 

[Wizardman]

First full game of rugby league I've watched in 2024. I am surprised by some of the comments on here as I looked at the game from an entirely different lens to quite a few on here. I thought your blokes were all over Souths in the game time that truly counted.....the first half. I saw way more positives than negatives in that half.

1. The intensity you guys played with in the first half was top notch.....particulary in getting your team up the field. They look ready to go for me for a big round one.

2. There is no doubt that there are a few guys who clearly look like they have had big off-seasons. Bird looks lean and mean, Rav looks as strong (and light footed) as ever and Lawrie.....he has been on the Lite n Easy program. They look and played a lot fitter......only 40 minutes I know, but their intensity was a step up from the Souths first graders.

The only negative I saw from last night was from the spine. It is the first trial and they certainly need more time to gel. It did look like there were two halfbacks out there last night....which is a concern. There was a lack of pushing up to run off any good offloads from their forwards. Sua gave a 100% tryscoring opportunity.....but nobody was there to take advantage. The two starting halves also looked a touch......slow. Hopefully, a 6 develops quickly or flanno/hunt improve their combo.

 

[Parko1310]

I get some of the shit being put on Sloan, but how many times during a season do people think he puts that ball down on the kick return? I'm thankful it's happened in a trial rather than regular season. If he doesn't make that mistake, people are going on about how much more confident he was under the high ball, which was my main positive take away from his game. Didn't let a single ball bounce, didn't lose a contest, and when he did get pushed back on kick returns it was maximum a couple metres. Most of the time he found his front and didn't lose yardage. That's improvement. He does need to get better at some things obviously which I pointed out after the game last night.

We should've put at least four tries on before half time yesterday, which tells you the attack isn't all bad. Yes it's rusty but Flano also said as little as a month ago that they hadn't done much work on ball in hand stuff yet. He wanted to get fitness and defence right first. So the attack will come along more, we do need to get more polish on the end of our plays and take our opportunities though, it will kill us if we don't. For me though, I actually saw some patterns of play in attack and a plan of what they were trying to do, and a lot of it worked. Our forwards were rolling up the middle in that first half.

Next week I would like to see Marchske given more minutes, and this time at hooker. He was good last night, and I'd have him in front of Mulheisen based on last night. BUT to affirm this, we need to see him on the field at hooker and also when the Tigers have their first grade side on. I'd like to see him brought on at about 20/25 mins next week and see if he can provide the same sort of output from a different position, and also against first graders. His service will need to be quicker than Mulheisen (it couldn't be much slower), and hopefully he will distribute the ball quicker off the back of second phase play which I believe he will being a natural half.

 

[kit66]

Do you remember the halftime score in last year's CS ? 26-0 to the Bunnies. I'm surprised some of you guys are still with us after that.
How many times last year did we hold a team to 0 until the 36th minute of the first half (or 0 in the first 40) ? I'm pretty sure it was only twice and we regularly let in early points in the first 10-15 minutes of most games. Our last game, round 27 it was 12 nil to the Knights after 7 minutes. So I'm pretty happy our first hit out was 6 all at halftime (and those tries both lucky freebies and both in the last 5 minutes of the half). Defence was our number one issue for 2024 and it looks like we've worked mightily on that, that's what wins you games. We blew a couple of try scoring opportunities but we created those opportunities and that's what counts this early on - something to work with. It was also 2 linebreaks to us and more importantly zero lb's to them, that's a rarity for us as well.
Agreed we need one or two more speedsters out there somewhere - Marschke and Tamale ?
I'm undecided on Bird, I'd like to see another game or two from him at centre, he can be a real handful for opposition backs but we'll see if it works for the team as a whole having him there.

Second half means little.
Toby is still the better Couchman - 6 runs for 66 mtrs, 30pcms and 17 tackles (couple of misses), if he can do that or better for us off the bench I'm happy with that - can add to his 15 games last year. His brother Ryan will likely be stuck in reserves until he can match Toby's efforts, reasonably good defender though.
Dylan Egan, you guys are hard taskmasters - he came on, didn't see much ball but racked up 22 tackles, no misses, he'll get better, it's not like he'll be in the 12 jersey come round 1, give the kid time.

 

[Wizardman]

I get some of the shit being put on Sloan, but how many times during a season do people think he puts that ball down on the kick return? I'm thankful it's happened in a trial rather than regular season. If he doesn't make that mistake, people are going on about how much more confident he was under the high ball, which was my main positive take away from his game. Didn't let a single ball bounce, didn't lose a contest, and when he did get pushed back on kick returns it was maximum a couple metres. Most of the time he found his front and didn't lose yardage. That's improvement. He does need to get better at some things obviously which I pointed out after the game last night.

We should've put at least four tries on before half time yesterday, which tells you the attack isn't all bad. Yes it's rusty but Flano also said as little as a month ago that they hadn't done much work on ball in hand stuff yet. He wanted to get fitness and defence right first. So the attack will come along more, we do need to get more polish on the end of our plays and take our opportunities though, it will kill us if we don't. For me though, I actually saw some patterns of play in attack and a plan of what they were trying to do, and a lot of it worked. Our forwards were rolling up the middle in that first half.

Next week I would like to see Marchske given more minutes, and this time at hooker. He was good last night, and I'd have him in front of Mulheisen based on last night. BUT to affirm this, we need to see him on the field at hooker and also when the Tigers have their first grade side on. I'd like to see him brought on at about 20/25 mins next week and see if he can provide the same sort of output from a different position, and also against first graders. His service will need to be quicker than Mulheisen (it couldn't be much slower), and hopefully he will distribute the ball quicker off the back of second phase play which I believe he will being a natural half.

Sloan clearly has game breaking capability. Dragons simply have to back him 100% and hope he develops further as the season goes on.

 

[Number of the Beath]

Sorry you took it that way NOTB. I thought we were just having a bit of banter to overcome our mutual disappointment at the team's performance. I admit I would rather blame the ref than the team at this stage of the year as I try not to sink into depression until at least June.

All good mate.
I try to be like that too but after last night I've already got the booze and pills out.
Even Obi Wan couldn't help us now.
They can't even lift themselves for grudge match.
It's fkn sad.

 

[since77]

First full game of rugby league I've watched in 2024. I am surprised by some of the comments on here as I looked at the game from an entirely different lens to quite a few on here. I thought your blokes were all over Souths in the game time that truly counted.....the first half. I saw way more positives than negatives in that half.

1. The intensity you guys played with in the first half was top notch.....particulary in getting your team up the field. They look ready to go for me for a big round one.

2. There is no doubt that there are a few guys who clearly look like they have had big off-seasons. Bird looks lean and mean, Rav looks as strong (and light footed) as ever and Lawrie.....he has been on the Lite n Easy program. They look and played a lot fitter......only 40 minutes I know, but their intensity was a step up from the Souths first graders.

The only negative I saw from last night was from the spine. It is the first trial and they certainly need more time to gel. It did look like there were two halfbacks out there last night....which is a concern. There was a lack of pushing up to run off any good offloads from their forwards. Sua gave a 100% tryscoring opportunity.....but nobody was there to take advantage. The two starting halves also looked a touch......slow. Hopefully, a 6 develops quickly or flanno/hunt improve their combo.

Hey! Get out of here with your even handed analysis!!! But seriously, they are very astute observations.

Also just noting to the doom and gloomers that the Wayne Bennet era also started with a loss in the Charity Shield and that star studded team only managed to score 6 points, the only try coming from a charge down by Beau Scott.......