Is our season slipping away?

[Jobdog]

After four straight losses, along with a bye, we haven't won for five weeks. After watching the second half effort last night, I thought to myself that our season is fast slipping away. At the risk of sounding like Nuffy P) I can't see an end to this losing streak in the coming weeks.

Before our bye, I made a comment to The_Joey_Show on the way home from the Bulldogs game that if the bye didn't solve all our problems, I wasn't sure what would. The bye has come and gone, and our problems haven't gone away. The first half last night was the best we've played for a while, but in the second half, we went back to our abysmal defensive best. I think that 28 points minimum will get us to the semi's which means along with our bye, we need four wins from our remaining nine games. I am of the opinion that we need to get a win in one of our next two games, if not both games.

Am I being too negative here, or what is everyone else's opinion?

 

[BWNB]

nah your team showed signs of hope, intensity in the 1st half
i am sure we will see you in september

 

[Voice of Reason]

Its that time of the year again. In my opinion we would want to win 5 of our remaining 9 games to finish on 30 points to make the 8 (we might get away with 4 from 9 to finish on 28). Looking at the draw we have 4 more home games (Storm, Rabits, Manly and Penrith) I think 2 wins there, maybe 3. We also have 5 away games (Manly, Parra, Cronulla, Roosters and Cowboys)- I can see 2 wins there, again maybe 3. If we go 2and 2 we will right on the edge of the 8. There are so many possibilities. It is clear to me hat tnhose who "assume" we will make the 8 are sadly off track. It will be marginal! Also we need to accrue a greater for and against in our remaining games as it may come down to that to make the 8. This year, more than any other, I feel that the 8th team could still win the GF if they play to their best on the day.

 

[Voice of Reason]

JD we were posting at the same time so we have both covered similar topics. I like you am very seriously worried about our prospects of making the top 8

 

[Jono078]

It is slipping away, no doubt.

But after Origin is over I think we will go on a nice winning streak.

Atm with Buderus in and out the combinations are a little 'rattled' i guess.

And with origin on Johns's mind.. So when origin is over Johns can concentrate on the Knights 110% and not think about other things like rep footy.

I think we will be right.. From round 20 onwards we will hit early season form I reckon.

 

[Jobdog]

Yeh VOR, I just noticed that as well. They'll probably get merged into the same thread I'd say. Great minds think alike hey ;-)

 

[Voice of Reason]

If Johns plays in SOO3 then I think we can all be confident that he will retire at season end and we will have a hell of a lot of money, albeit too late for 2007, to put into 2008. That implies, Im sorry to say, that 2007 looks like another "train wreck" of a season.

 

[Spitty]

I'm starting to think that myself. Really sharks put very little pressure on us in the first half, as soon as they did apply some pressure the lateral and one on one defense of some of out larger less athletic forwards really became obvious. I don't see how at this point in the season you can improve that area of play with the current personel.

The light at the end of the tunnel is that we have often shown poor defence but have managed to outscore our opposition regardless and our attack looked much more sleak than it has in the past.

 

[Holla if ya hear me]

defence is a mental attitude..manly next then parra then storm.We were up for this game vs sharks but fell short...hope we can overcome the mind side of the game so that we go into the final few games with some wins..from there..with good go forward.. johns can create anything..and so can Mullen

 

[Alex28]

I'm going with slipped...

It doesn't seem to matter whether Johns is in good or poor form - there are quite a few other players who just aren't up to First Grade and we have given them plenty of time to cut it at that level.

We looked very good early in the season, and we haven't had that bad an injury run this year...so what exactly has gone wrong? Surely it isn't just missing Thaiday? Is it guys taking their spot in First Grade for granted given they know their spot is safe no matter how poor their performance is?

The sooner 2006 is done and we have a bloke who can make the hard decisions for the good of the club, the better.

 

[Voice of Reason]

Spot on Alex- TOO MANY UNDERACHIEVING, OVERPAID PREMIERS LEAGUE PLAYERS in our NRL team.Like I said in the post-game thread, if Lowrie (Premy player) holds the ball with two arms and falls over properly, or, if George (Premey player) catches a simple perfect pass 12 mtr from our own tryline and Cronulla dont get the turnover they dont score, or if the same culprit could tackle etc and so on .....we win the game. Yes we had very poor decisions go against us BUT we again were our own enemies because we have players being asked to perform in an arena above their real abilities.

 

[macavity]

its already slipped.

we realistically need to finish top4 to give it a shake, and the best we can hope for now is sorta 7/8. even if we make the 8 (50/50) we will be out in the first week.

absolute b.s, it WAS there for the taking.

 

[Ben]

I think we haven't lost it yet, because the first half was a sign that Knights don't have to be extremely fancy to get the job done. I think the rest of our season has to be placed on doing the simple stuff right. The team is extremely down on confidence and they have to work on the basics. I think we had the right mindset against the Sharks. Take the ball up the middle with little set plays and second man plays. Darting out of the dummy half and blind side raids. Before Johns eventually took it wide with the cut-out passes.

For the team to bounce back, that is the mentality that they have to take into every game. With Thaiday out, we have not spark in the backline. Until he comes back, please make it soon, we just have to play a simple brand of footy.

 

[knights9]

We will get a win soon enough although they are going to find it tough next week against Manly at Brookvale. I think we can still make the 8 easy.

 

[RABK]

Thaiday is the messiah.

 

[Burwood]

We aren't travelling well at the moment, but I don't think that there is much chance of us missing the top 8. If you look at the ladder then you'll see that there aren't really any teams outside of the top 8 who can get in there (cowboys the exception).

Panthers already have had both byes and haven't been playing great football, the Tigers season is over now that benji is out, and teams like the Warriors, Roosters and Eels are too far behind.

 

[Rod]

Thaiday is the messiah.

Couldn't agree more. I think when he comes back we will see how much of a gap he left. He has become such a vital part of our team over the last year, just his attacking potency is something we've really lacked. Our defence the whole year has been a bit suspect, but when he is there we always look like scoring points. Please please hurry back Milton!

As for our season, we're not gone, in fact I'm pretty confident of making the eight. Going beyond that, I think we should be aiming for the top four, but this is looking less likely. This Sea Eagles match is shaping into a bit of a must win really, win that and then the Eels match the next week and straightaway we're back IMO. I think to make the top four we need to win perhaps 6 of our 9, that will give us 14 wins. I'm putting the loss to the Sharks down to some bad luck, and we actually looked good for most of the game, if a couple of things had gone our way we would have put at least 30 on them. As much as I hate to say it, the Sharks are a very good side atm and we were unlucky not to win.

So, in terms of the competition it might seem like the comp is slipping away but in terms of the standard of football we want to be playing, we're not far off capturing the form of the first few rounds.

 

[cram]

Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away (Simon and Garfunkel)

 

[The_Joey_Show]

Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away (Simon and Garfunkel)

I think you succinctly (not to mention musically!) make a very good point there Cram. Luckily, the Knights are not near their destination yet.

Our destination is October 1, at Telstra Stadium. I still firmly believe that we will be there. Every club will go through a slump this year... I think it is much better that we get ours out of the way now. We just need to make sure we stop the rot NOW. As Warren Ryan once said, "there is no problem ithin a football club that can;t be fixed by four straight wins".

As for slip sliding away as the destination draws nearer... that's reallly more the Dragons style!

 

[Master Vippo]

Us and the cowboys are having very similar fortunes this year. We both looked near unbeatable. Now we are both slipping awaaayyyy. I hope we wake up soon.

We are both sleeping giants