Eels in the media

[chuurness]

I'm more focussed on the allegation (again, son #2 now) that he didn't deserve his spot in Matts, Ball or Flegg.

I'd like to know from the guys who know juniors if this is true or just a bullshit agenda. It seems to be repeated by people who don't even watch juniors, but benefit of the doubt etc. Like to know from the guys who know their junior footy.

Ping @Stagger eel @Obscene Assassin @ALX25 @Delboy @chuurness .

Just my opinion... if we are talking about matty Arthur... young guns a beast...very good hooker. Well deserved spot. Everyone who knows the junior system for ANY club knows its also a "who u know" type of business. So of course being BAs son would of helped to some degree. But regardless whether or not he's an Arthur... for his age coming thru the grades at parra... he is up there with the best hookers going round and I feel his spot us well deserved.
Don't hate... this is just my opinion.

 

[Gronk]

Um……who ?

I agreed a one-year deal with Parramatta Eels for the 2014 season but Huddersfield wanted a fee for me at the time and in rugby league you don’t have many people buying or spending money,” Lunt told League Express.

Ex-Super League star Shaun Lunt reveals the top-flight club he had agreed ‘a one-year deal’ with before move fell through

FORMER Super League star Shaun Lunt is now happily retired. Following spells in Super League with Huddersfield Giants, Leeds Rhinos and Hull KR, the hooker made a move to Batley Bulldogs ahead of t…

www.totalrl.com

 

[Stagger eel]

Um……who ?

I agreed a one-year deal with Parramatta Eels for the 2014 season but Huddersfield wanted a fee for me at the time and in rugby league you don’t have many people buying or spending money,” Lunt told League Express.

Ex-Super League star Shaun Lunt reveals the top-flight club he had agreed ‘a one-year deal’ with before move fell through

FORMER Super League star Shaun Lunt is now happily retired. Following spells in Super League with Huddersfield Giants, Leeds Rhinos and Hull KR, the hooker made a move to Batley Bulldogs ahead of t…

www.totalrl.com

I'm assuming that was prior to us landing Peats..

 

[hineyrulz]

Ricky didn’t master the Pommy signing thing until he got to Canberra.

 

[Poupou Escobar]

Um……who ?

Lunt ffs

 

[King-Gutho94]

Ricky didn’t master the Pommy signing thing until he got to Canberra.

Well it's a match made in heaven.

Canberra and England are both shitholes so the poms wouldn't know anything different when living in Canberra.

 

[Cumberland Eel]

Um……who ?

I agreed a one-year deal with Parramatta Eels for the 2014 season but Huddersfield wanted a fee for me at the time and in rugby league you don’t have many people buying or spending money,” Lunt told League Express.

Ex-Super League star Shaun Lunt reveals the top-flight club he had agreed ‘a one-year deal’ with before move fell through

FORMER Super League star Shaun Lunt is now happily retired. Following spells in Super League with Huddersfield Giants, Leeds Rhinos and Hull KR, the hooker made a move to Batley Bulldogs ahead of t…

www.totalrl.com

Shaun Lurkin

 

[eels_fan]

Um……who ?

One of the worlds greatest Lunt’s, from a family of Lunt’s

 

[hineyrulz]

Shaun Lurkin

You can’t have merkin without Lurkin.

 

[Eelementary]

Just my opinion... if we are talking about matty Arthur... young guns a beast...very good hooker. Well deserved spot. Everyone who knows the junior system for ANY club knows its also a "who u know" type of business. So of course being BAs son would of helped to some degree. But regardless whether or not he's an Arthur... for his age coming thru the grades at parra... he is up there with the best hookers going round and I feel his spot us well deserved.
Don't hate... this is just my opinion.

Mate, I agree with you.

Matt Arthur is a genuine prospect.

 

[Twizzle]

2023 review: Parramatta Eels​

Eelementary | October 31 2023 8:08AM

Embed from Getty Images

Our 2023 NRL club season review series looks at last year's Grand Finalists Parramatta - who we can only say have underperformed this season.

---

"Nervous excitement" - that is the phrase that this reviewer would have used to characterise Eels fans' feelings heading into season 2023.​

While the club was hot on the heels of making its first Grand Final appearance in thirteen years - a cause of excitement, in anyone's book - several key players signed deals to play elsewhere for 2023, and beyond, questions lingered over their replacements.

Parramatta began season 2023 hampered by the absences of Ryan Matterson (chosen suspension - he could've paid a fine), Shaun Lane (injury), and Sean Russell (injury), and lost their opening three matches of the season by 4 points or less. In those matches, Mitchell Moses kicked 3/5 conversions against the Sharks, and 3/6 against Manly, before pulling off a Golden Point win over the Panthers in Round 4.

Their next five games read loss-win-win-loss-win (their biggest victory margin coming against Newcastle, in an emphatic 43 to 12 win).

They lost their next two games, before beating South Sydney 36-16, which began a resurgence, of sorts - Parramatta won their next four consecutive games, with two byes scattered among them, before being crushed 46-10 by the Warriors.

They never recovered after that loss, winning only three of their final seven games, to finish the season in tenth.

And thus ended the Eels' 2023 campaign - not with a bang, but a whimper. Injuries, suspensions, and poor roster management took its toll on the club.

Turning points​

It's disingenuous to state there would be a positive turning point, given the team's inconsistent performances throughout 2023, but a bright light was the continued development of J'maine Hopgood, and the emergence of Brendan Hands as a bench utility.

Dylan Brown's seven-game suspension incurred at the Eels' round 14 bye though, ensured a hitherto-inconsistent season would continue, as the Eels resorted to using Matterson and Daejarn Asi in the halves to partner Mitchell Moses. Shortly after, Asi and Matterson found themselves at times being the Eels' starting halves pairing, due to Moses' unavailability through injury.

Despite playing Origin this season, Junior Paulo had arguably his poorest season in Eels colours to date, and his decline added more burden on his front-row partners' shoulders.

What Worked​

Simply put, this is a football team built to overpower opponents through the middle third with power running. When this tactic worked, and when the flow of possession favoured the Eels, they were effective at winning the yardage battle, and scoring points; certainly, attack has not been Parramatta's weakness for a number of seasons.

The tactics generally employed were to feed the ball to their powerful forward pack, and let them run amok.

Aside from the odd outlier (in Round 1, Parramatta out-ran Melbourne to the tune of 210 runs to 200, but made 17,01 metres to Melbourne's 1,949 metres), when Parramatta got their power running right, it took some stopping.

What Didn't Work​

Teams figured out the Eels' gameplan, and loaded up the ruck in defence.

The Eels did not have a plan B, save from throwing offloads, hoping they would stick - when teams got in Parramatta's face, and compressed their defence, the Eels had no answer.

Parramatta's back three have their own strengths - Gutherson is skilful, and defensively excellent; Sivo is powerful; and Russell and Simonsson are quick - but their collective weakness is returning the ball from kicks.

Using Round 1 again as an example, Parramatta's average set distance was 37.81 metres (compared to Melbourne's 40.61 metres), and the Eels returned kicks for 126 metres (compared to Melbourne's 277 metres).

To put this into further perspective, Melbourne kicked the ball 20 times, and Parramatta totalled 126 metres from it - a return of 6.3 metres per return.

Parramatta kicked the ball 26 times, and Melbourne made 277 metres - an average of 10.65 metes per return.

Over the 48 sets Melbourne had, that equates to 511.38 metres (as compared to Parramatta's 45 sets, and 283.5 metres).

2023 week-by-week​

Rnd	Date	Day		Opposition					Venue	Crowd	Rank
1	Mar 2nd	Thu 7:50pm	H	Melbourne	L	12	-	16	CommBank	17,301	12th
2	Mar 10th	Fri 6:00pm	H	Cronulla	L	26	-	30	CommBank	16,663	16th
3	Mar 16th	Thu 7:50pm	A	Manly	L	30	-	34	4 Pines	13,363	13th
4	Mar 23rd	Thu 7:50pm	H	Penrith	W	17	-	16	CommBank	16,342	16th
5	Mar 30th	Thu 7:50pm	A	Sydney	L	20	-	28	Allianz	20,886	15th
6	Apr 10th	Mon 4:00pm	A N	Wests Tigers	W	28	-	22	Accor	28,611	14th
7	Apr 16th	Sun 4:05pm	H	Canterbury	W	30	-	4	CommBank	27,655	13th
8	Apr 21st	Fri 7:30pm	H N	Brisbane	L	16	-	26	TIO	11,864	13th
9	Apr 28th	Fri 6:00pm	H	Newcastle	W	43	-	12	CommBank	15,875	13th
10	May 7th	Sun 6:25pm	A N	Gold Coast	L	24	-	26	Suncorp	46,835	13th
11	May 13th	Sat 7:35pm	A	Canberra	L	18	-	26	GIO	17,414	14th
12	May 19th	Fri 8:00pm	A N	Souths	W	36	-	16	Allianz	27,432	14th
13	May 26th	Fri 8:00pm	H	North QLD	W	24	-	16	CommBank	14,810	10th
14				BYE			-
15	Jun 12th	Mon 4:00pm	A	Canterbury	W	34	-	12	Accor	33,866	11th
16	Jun 17th	Sat 5:30pm	H	Manly	W	34	-	4	CommBank	21,296	8th
17	Jun 24th	Sat 3:00pm	A N	Dolphins	W	48	-	20	Sun. Coast	8,821	5th
18				BYE			-
19	Jul 8th	Sat 5:30pm	H	Warriors	L	10	-	46	CommBank	21,696	8th
20	Jul 16th	Sun 6:15pm	H	Gold Coast	W	25	-	24	CommBank	12,599	7th
21	Jul 22nd	Sat 7:35pm	A	North QLD	L	16	-	24	QLD C B	20,710	8th
22	Jul 28th	Fri 8:00pm	A N	Melbourne	L	16	-	46	Marvel	20,429	11th
23	Aug 6th	Sun 2:00pm	H	St Geo Illa	W	26	-	20	CommBank	23,596	10th
24	Aug 11th	Fri 8:00pm	A	Brisbane	L	10	-	54	/td>	29,005	10th
25	Aug 18th	Fri 8:00pm	H	Sydney	L	12	-	34	CommBank	20,076	9th
26	Aug 24th	Thu 7:50pm	A	Penrith	W	32	-	18	Bluebet	21,525	10th
27				BYE							10th

​

 

[Twizzle]

Best Players​

Clinton Gutherson is a player that can be relied upon, no matter the occasion. He was once again defensively excellent, commanding his defensive line, and creating in attack - he played 23 games, scored 19 tries, had 14 try assists, 71 tackle breaks, 15 linebreaks, and averaged 162 metres per game.

J'maine Hopgood continued his impressive rise to star player, throwing an astonishing 56 offloads in 2023, and making 965 tackles at an efficiency of 93.4%.

Rookies​

Brad Arthur gave his Parramatta debuts to Daejarn Asi, Brendan Hands, and Luca Moretti in 2023.

All three players showed glimpses of potential, and stepped in for key positions throughout the season, and were able to hold their own.

Disappointing Players​

Junior Paulo is the Eels co-captain, a NSW regular, and a Samoan stalwart - but his 2023 season was below average by his standards.

He finished with an average 147 metres per game, but his involvement was low; he averaged 12.8 hitups per game (Hopgood averaged 12.8 hitups per game), and 22 tackles per game, at 92.6% efficiency in the middle.

But rugby league is a team game, and you would be hard-pressed to find too many Eels in 2023 who shone bright.

2023 player list​

Player	Age	P	T	G	FG	Pts	Bin	Off
ARTHUR, Jakob	20	1	-	-	-	-	-	-
ASI, Daejarn	23	10	-	-	-	-	-	-
BLAKE, Waqa	28	7	-	-	-	-	-	-
BROWN, Dylan	23	17	3	-	-	12	-	-
CAMPBELL- GILLARD, Reagan	30	14	3	-	-	12	1	-
CARTWRIGHT, Bryce	28	24	7	-	-	28	-	-
DAVEY, Andrew	31	12	2	-	-	8	-	-
DOOREY, Matt	23	11	1	-	-	4	-	-
DUNSTER, Haze	24	5	-	-	-	-	-	-
GREIG, Wiremu	23	17	1	-	-	4	-	-
GUTHERSON, Clinton	28	23	19	16	-	108	1	-
HANDS, Brendan	23	19	1	-	-	4	-	-
HODGSON, Josh	33	12	1	-	-	4	-	-
HOPGOOD, J'maine	24	24	4	-	-	16	1	-
LANE, Shaun	28	10	1	-	-	4	-	-
LUMELUME, Isaac	25	2	-	-	-	-	-	-
LUSSICK, Joey	27	5	-	-	-	-	-	-
MAKATOA, Makahesi	30	17	1	-	-	4	-	-
MATTERSON, Ryan	28	18	-	-	-	-	-	-
MILLER- STEPHEN, Arthur	-	1	1	-	-	4	-	-
MOMOISEA, Jirah	24	3	-	-	-	-	-	-
MORETTI, Luca	23	11	1	-	-	4	-	-
MOSES, Mitchell	28	19	7	69	3	169	-	-
MURCHIE, Jack	26	5	-	-	-	-	-	-
OFAHENGAUE, Joe	27	11	-	-	-	-	-	-
OGDEN, Ofahiki	27	9	1	-	-	4	1	-
PAULO, Junior	29	20	3	-	-	12	1	-
PENISINI, Will	21	24	8	-	-	32	1	-
RUSSELL, Sean	21	17	9	1	-	38	-	-
SIMONSSON, Bailey	25	20	9	-	-	36	1	-
SIVO, Maika	29	20	20	-	-	80	1	-

31 players used, average age 26.53yrs

Season snapshot​

Coach: Brad Arthur
Captains: Clinton Gutherson (23), Junior Paulo (5)

Biggest home crowd: 27,655 (vs. Canterbury in round 7)
Average home crowd: 18,901

Top pointscorer: Mitchell Moses (169)
Top tryscorer: Maika Sivo (20)

Club award winners​

• Ken Thornett Medal (NRL Player of the Year): Clint Gutherson
• Nathan Hindmarsh Players' Player: Clint Gutherson
• Jack Gibson Coaches' Award: Will Penisini
• Eric Grothe Rookie of the Year: Wiremu Greig
• Ray Price Community Award: Junior Paulo
• Bob O'Reilly NSW Cup Player of the Year: Luca Moretti
• Geoff Gerard NSW Cup Coaches' Award: Ky Rodwell
• Steve Ella Jersey Flegg Player of the Year: Nick Lenaz
• Brett Kenny Jersey Flegg Coaches' Award: Brock Parker
• Michael Cronin Club Person of the Year: Steve Murphy & Monique Austin

Looking Ahead​

The Parramatta club, and its fans, have been starved of meaningful success for almost 4 decades; it is not unreasonable to say that patience is beginning to wear thin with the Eels faithful.

Missing the Finals after making a Grand Final appearance the prior season should not be considered as acceptable.

The Eels saw two medical retirements in 2023 - Josh Hodgson, and Andrew Davey - and were quick to add centre Morgan Harper to their books.

The real challenge will be to see if Brad Arthur can instil a steely resolve into this team to play with power, tempo, and aggression for the full 80 minutes.

There have not been any significant roster changes to date, and so the hope is that the Eels can have some luck with injuries in 2024, show some discipline on, and off, the field to avoid unnecessary suspensions, and give the competition a genuine shake; certainly, the one club that has seemingly caused reigning Premiers Penrith some headaches in recent seasons is Parramatta, and so if Brad Arthur can unlock the sleeping giant potential within this club…who knows where it may lead?

Best 2024 Round 1 lineup​

based on current signings at time of writing

1. Clinton Gutherson (C)
2. Maika Sivo
3. Will Penisini
4. Bailey Simonsson
5. Sean Rusell
6. Dylan Brown
7. Mitchell Moses
8. Reagan Campbell-Gillard
9. Brendan Hands
10. Junior Paulo (C)
11. Bryce Cartwright
12. Shaun Lane
13. J'Maine Hopgood

14. Daejarn Asi
15. Wiremu Greig
16. Luca Moretti
17. Ryan Matterson




More articles from Eelementary.

2023 review: Parramatta Eels » League Unlimited

leagueunlimited.com

 

[hineyrulz]

Nice job @Eelementary

 

[burl]

Ofahengaue > Moretti

 

[Delboy]

Lussick for Asi
Ofagenhaue for Moretti

Starting 13 picks itself ( barring an unexpected move from the slow reacting recruitment team ), Probably need Lussick and Hands in the 17 to provide energy for 80 minutes. Moretti could well be first pick when needed .

 

[Lemon Squash]

From what we saw late in the season I'm in the Moretti camp over Joe-O, he actually made a bit of impact off the bench.

I have faith Joe-O will still prove handy but at this stage wouldn't make my 17... Plenty to happen in the off-season though.

 

[yy_cheng]

From what we saw late in the season I'm in the Moretti camp over Joe-O, he actually made a bit of impact off the bench.

I have faith Joe-O will still prove handy but at this stage wouldn't make my 17... Plenty to happen in the off-season though.

Moretti and Emu could be our starting props in 2 to 3 years. Joe o had a great last game so i would start him and if he plays shit then Moretti takes his spot

 

[Happy MEel]

Great write up @Eelementary. Appreciate the time and effort that went into it.

 

[hineyrulz]

Joe O is a lazy sloth, he always has been. I watched him under perform at the Donkeys on a weekly basis. He stood out in a shit Tigers team and all of a sudden he’s some superstar. Morretti has hunger, leg speed and more upside. Watch him get stuck in reserve grade while Bea Arthur goes for the experienced plodder.

 

[Poupou Escobar]

Ofahengaue > Moretti

By a f**king mile