This one hurts a lot because we had this game in the palm of our hands at 20-20, Cronulla were on the ropes and we were running downhill, unfortunately this game is a game of inches and is exemplified by Townsend only just slotting his field goal and Cleary only just missing his.
Still though, we can't get out of jail every week, imagine how good this team could be if they stopped digging themselves such a big hole in the first half of games.
Maloney was very poor tonight, I think I've said this before but he is a double-edged sword, he is a great leader and directs the boys around the park well, but when he isn't on his glaring weaknesses are constantly exposed by good teams, Sharks clearly know this as much as we do and constantly targeted his side in defence, and tonight he just didn't offer anything near enough in attack to make up for his short-comings, still though I think we should stick with him because I don't think there are any experienced 5/8s on the market that is an upgrade over him.
Katoa isn't good enough for our team and needs to be replaced going forward, I really hope Gould goes back on his statement of bringing guys into the team only from within, this has been echoed a lot but it's clear we need more experienced guys out there to help out this young team, I hope we chase Korisau hard because he is exactly what we need.
On a positive note I think despite all the scrutiny the media gave us over sacking Griffin we turned it around big time with an inexperienced coach at the top level, I wouldn't even mind giving Ciraldo the fulltime gig because he got a lot out of us in a short period of time under a lot of pressure, it looked like we were heading straight for a week 1 smashing but we turned it on against the Warriors and put up a hell of a fight in tonight's second half (I know we did that a lot this year but to do it in a final against Crounlla is even better imo)
