Poupou Escobar
Post Whore
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This not true, because it's all relative.
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This not true, because it's all relative.
By the same age Gutherson had played five NRL games, four of them at wing or centre.
Melbourne have two NRL quality dummy halves. We don't. In fact most teams don't have that luxury. For years neither did Melbourne, and so their only NRL quality hooker played 80 minutes nearly every week.
Souths will definitely be weaker next year. A bunch of their top 17 are already 30 years old, plus Reynolds is being replaced by Milford, so their kicking game will suffer. Penrith are losing a couple of top 17 players as well. Taupau, DCE and Foran are all key players at Manly and all on the wrong side of 30, though it should be offset by improvement in their youngsters. The Roosters are also an aging side, perhaps offset by youngsters coming through. We could supplant any of these, but to do so doesn't really have much to do with coaching as it does with improvement of the squad. At this stage the oldest players in our squad next year will be Paulo, RCG and Nrown, who all turn 29 in 2022. Meanwhile ten players who played NRL this year will be 23 or younger next year. Mahoney and Papali'i will turn 24.
Would you agree that at our best we were better this year?
It's not about the minutes, it's about their attacking involvement.
Exactly, which is why Papali'i in the middle for 35 minutes was ideal. He made twice as many runs as Lane but made fewer tackles. This is how you want to use your better forwards. It's easier for the opposition to stop your edge forwards from getting good ball than it is to stop your middles. Plus edge forwards can be isolated in defence, and I don't think Papali'i is such a great defender one-on-one.
I think this is why he's been moved back to the right edge. We want to get him the ball with a bit of room, but it requires Dylan Brown playing in the middle (like Cleary) and reading the defence, which he isn't great at.
They had the best defence this year and the fourth best attack. Last year they had the best defence and the second best attack. So really, defence has been the feature of their team these previous two years, and they showed it again last night.
Yep. Gutherson's contract negotiations and the 2018 wooden spoon are the alarm bells around our club. Consistently losing in week two of the finals is just a statistic that makes for dramatic narratives.
Don't look at the amount of time they're given, look at it in terms of runs and tackles. Divide them by the minutes if you want more insight, but just saying player-x got more minutes than player-y is meaningless. What was their role while they were on the field?
Should we sign one of them?
They're wrong. By 24 Johns was already a freak. He had won the Dally M and turned a grand final on his own. Cleary is definitely one of the best players in the game but more like Cronk; a composed, physical half who executes well.
Do you think we'll ever be certainties to win a finals match? Under any coach?
They must really rate him…
I didn't hate him but I thought he must be lacking something for Brian Smith to give him the captaincy.
I think our chances will increase with the right coach.
Money??? The chance to work with the genius footballing mind that is BA?? A strong young squad that is on rise with a centre of excellence on the way. Why are you so hellbent on talking down the club at every opportunity?? It’s disgusting!!!!!
Could’ve the two words us Eels fans have been hearing since 1986.
