Sheens livid with critics as Tigers cop a hammering
By Will Swanton, Brookvale Oval
February 26, 2006
Sea Eagles 42 Tigers 14
BRETT Hodgson last night called for Scott Prince to retain the Wests Tigers captaincy regardless of whether he signs for another NRL club as coach Tim Sheens vented his spleen about former players Tom Raudonikis and Les Boyd calling for Prince to lose the leadership.
The Tigers were smashed. Benji Marshall, where the hell are you?
Sheens and Hodgson denied Marshall could save the Tigers singlehandedly but the focus was on Prince following his meeting with Gold Coast officials during the week. The meeting was held with the Tigers' blessing and Sheens was livid that it attracted scathing criticism from Raudonikis and Boyd.
"That's just bullsh*t journalism," Sheens said. "You dig out players from years ago and talk about clubs. For me to have to stand here and defend it is bloody ridiculous. Anyone can do that. If Scott wants to stay, he'll stay. If he wants to go, he'll go.
"Scott played as well as the ball he got.
"He did some good things and struggled with defence after a period of time because of the amount of ball we turned over, as simple as that.
"His forwards didn't dominate the game." He later told television reporters: "I do recall Les playing for Manly and Tommy leaving as well."
Sheens refused to say whether Prince - who declined to comment and appeared in a dark mood - would be captain even if he was leaving next season because it was "a hypothetical question", but Hodgson firmly believed the leadership should stay in the halfback's hands.
"Yep, he should be [captain], for sure," Hodgson said.
On Marshall's return for the round-one clash against the Dragons, Hodgson added: "Benji wouldn't have won us that game today. We defended poorly and we dropped too many balls.
"One player won't make a massive difference if we can't control the ruck and hold the ball. We've got a long couple of weeks coming up. You want to build momentum in the trials and we haven't done that."
The Tigers scored in the third minute to lead 6-0. An arm wrestle ensued until Manly halfback Matt Orford sent Anthony Watmough over to square the ledger at 6-6.
The Tigers' Keith Galloway stepped onto Brookvale Oval for the first time since John Hopoate knocked him senseless last year but the former Cronulla forward was powerless to stop Manly's Kylie Leuluai from crashing over off a Michael Monaghan ball. The Eagles led 12-6 at half-time.
An all-in brawl followed Watmough's try. He collided with Prince while putting the ball down, wasn't happy about it and started throwing punches. Players came in from everywhere before Watmough was sent away to the sin bin to cool his heels for 10 minutes.
Quick tries after the break to Steve Matai and Jason King put the Sea Eagles ahead 20-6 but Prince snuck over to peg the deficit to 12 points with 30 minutes to go. An 85 metre movement from the Eagles fell apart at the 84th metre. The Tigers did not look like the premiers. Marshall cannot return soon enough. Manly skipped away a little too comfortably in a eight-try romp.
"We didn't win any trials last year, either, but I'm not going to brush it aside and say what they did was acceptable, not at all," Sheens said.
