Knights V Titans Post Match Thread

[Jobdog]

No, but by far the most vocal ...

 

[Karmawave]

No, but by far the most vocal ...

I'm the most vocal on any topic. :lol:

 

[Joker's Wild]

It was Dureau's best tackle all night.


( Postnote: There ARE other people in this very same thread who don't rate Supersub either - open your eyes :lol: - I'm far from the only one )

To be fair Karma, most dont make statements like the one in bold above either. We get that you dont rate Scotty but you dont have to neon light it.

BTW I find it funny FTW

 

[Karmawave]

To be honest mate, most of the stuff I say about the bloke is tongue firmly planted in cheek. Just a bit of light hearted fun.

I don't think he is a quality first grade halfback when compared to his NRL halfback peers ( so far behind most of them its not even funny ), but of course he is not as bad as I make out.

He is solid enough to let the more talented players around him shine.

 

[Joker's Wild]

To be honest mate, most of the stuff I say about the bloke is tongue firmly planted in cheek. Just a bit of light hearted fun.

I realise that too. I usually LOL at your "anti-Dureau" posts for that reason.

 

[Karmawave]

He's still a Supersub :lol:

 

[BG]

LOL
Lets p!ss him off and put Kidley there :sarcasm:

We've produced some of our best football this year when Gids has played in the halves in attack. He's an infinitely better playmaker than he used to be. Smith hinted in a media conference a month or so back that he is considering moving him there next season. I guess that would depend on whether we have another genuine fullback option and whether Gids can improve his general kicking game. As for the latter, there were some interesting quotes attributed to Smith in the press prior to Origin 1, when it was believed Bellamy wanted to start Gids at halfback. Smith basically said that with his new-found playmaking skills Gids would add plenty of spark to NSW's attack but he was suggesting Bird would have to be shifted to lock to allow someone with a kicking game like Anasta to play 5/8th. More intriguingly, he said he believed Gids could be an excellent general play kicker with some intensive pratice at it--but not within 10 days of origin camp. Reading between the lines, he's got some specialist off-season training in line for Gids. With no Bailey next year, I suspect Gids will at least become our first back-up option if one of our halves are out. And we will almost certainly see a regular use of the fullback-in-D/halves-in-offence role we have seen him adopt at various stages in recent weeks.

 

[Stranger]

Jeeze Karma, you refuse to believe anything Scotty does is any good...

Need to let go of the agenda just a little bit mate, Its getting tiresome. Really we don't have a better choice.

If anything, a fair few of Buderus' passes went to ground but that being said, we stuck to the game plan perfectly.

 

[Whats Doing]

Karma has a view and takes it to the nth degree which makes it very funny. I enjoy the humour in his comments.

Keep it up.

BTW - Luv the picture of the dog depicting Karma and the dog bone. Classic stuff!

 

[Adsy]

I don't know why so many people are swallowing Karma's tripe.

With Dureau on the field we are a better footy side. Even if you believe he is just 'making up the numbers' he is another playmaker that keeps the defence guessing which allows our forwards to run great lines off his passes.

Dureau at halfback means Mullen is at 5/8 which is his best position by a mile.

Dureau at halfback means Gidley at fullback which is his best position by a mile and just because Gidley is at the back doesn't mean he can't move up and attack in the halves which in effect gives us 3 halves during some sets.

Dureau has the best long kicking game at the club. If he wasn't there we would be putting extra pressure on our defence to defend sets starting closer to our danger zone.

His defence is on par with alot of halves in the NRL. How many times has he been singled out and run over for a try? Once? Twice all year? Some halves conceed a try a game from their poor defence.

If you leave Mullen at 5/8 and shift Gids to halfback our kicking goes to sh*t and we have two running halves which would result in our organisation going down the drain.

Also who goes to fullback? Aku? Can he really organise our defence from the back? I don't think so.

As a halves combination at the moment Mullen & Dureau play some of the most attacking and exciting footy in the NRL. I enjoy watching a game with them both steering us around the park & then having Buderus and Gidley injecting themselves into the attack when the time is right.

We have the right mix when it's Gidley, Mullen, Dureau & Buderus. I really hope Smithy doesn't change that combination for the rest of the year.

 

[Yosh]

With Dureau in the side our attack is definately more fluid and more expansive, and gives Mullen the extra space he needs to give a deadly ball or take on the line itself. Dureau kicking was pretty decent to... Dont know what else you expect from the bloke... Did well son did well!!

 

[K-Man]

I don't know why so many people are swallowing Karma's tripe.

With Dureau on the field we are a better footy side. Even if you believe he is just 'making up the numbers' he is another playmaker that keeps the defence guessing which allows our forwards to run great lines off his passes.

Dureau at halfback means Mullen is at 5/8 which is his best position by a mile.

Dureau at halfback means Gidley at fullback which is his best position by a mile and just because Gidley is at the back doesn't mean he can't move up and attack in the halves which in effect gives us 3 halves during some sets.

Dureau has the best long kicking game at the club. If he wasn't there we would be putting extra pressure on our defence to defend sets starting closer to our danger zone.

His defence is on par with alot of halves in the NRL. How many times has he been singled out and run over for a try? Once? Twice all year? Some halves conceed a try a game from their poor defence.

If you leave Mullen at 5/8 and shift Gids to halfback our kicking goes to sh*t and we have two running halves which would result in our organisation going down the drain.

Also who goes to fullback? Aku? Can he really organise our defence from the back? I don't think so.

As a halves combination at the moment Mullen & Dureau play some of the most attacking and exciting footy in the NRL. I enjoy watching a game with them both steering us around the park & then having Buderus and Gidley injecting themselves into the attack when the time is right.

We have the right mix when it's Gidley, Mullen, Dureau & Buderus. I really hope Smithy doesn't change that combination for the rest of the year.

Adsy it is not possible for me to agree with a post any more than this

 

[K-Man]

I don't know why so many people are swallowing Karma's tripe.

With Dureau on the field we are a better footy side. Even if you believe he is just 'making up the numbers' he is another playmaker that keeps the defence guessing which allows our forwards to run great lines off his passes.

Dureau at halfback means Mullen is at 5/8 which is his best position by a mile.

Dureau at halfback means Gidley at fullback which is his best position by a mile and just because Gidley is at the back doesn't mean he can't move up and attack in the halves which in effect gives us 3 halves during some sets.

Dureau has the best long kicking game at the club. If he wasn't there we would be putting extra pressure on our defence to defend sets starting closer to our danger zone.

His defence is on par with alot of halves in the NRL. How many times has he been singled out and run over for a try? Once? Twice all year? Some halves conceed a try a game from their poor defence.

If you leave Mullen at 5/8 and shift Gids to halfback our kicking goes to sh*t and we have two running halves which would result in our organisation going down the drain.

Also who goes to fullback? Aku? Can he really organise our defence from the back? I don't think so.

As a halves combination at the moment Mullen & Dureau play some of the most attacking and exciting footy in the NRL. I enjoy watching a game with them both steering us around the park & then having Buderus and Gidley injecting themselves into the attack when the time is right.

We have the right mix when it's Gidley, Mullen, Dureau & Buderus. I really hope Smithy doesn't change that combination for the rest of the year.

Adsy it is not possible for me to agree with a post any more than I do this one

I don't know how some people still fail to see that it is not so much about Dureau as an individual player, but about what the role he provides does for our team balance.

I don't for a second think that he is or ever will be a superstar. Would I trade him Prince, Thurston, Cronk, Wallace, Orford and others? Yes I would, but NOT for the difference in price.

The fact is that if we went and bought a higher profile, top quality halfback we would have to pay a lot more for them than we pay Dureau, which would weaken our strength in other areas. We don't need that type of player because we already have Gidly and Mullen for the spark. If our fullback was someone like McKinnon for Warriors, and our 5/8th was someone like Lyon/Menzies for Manly, then YES we would need a top shelf half to be the organisation and the creativity. But our squad has balance and Scott does his job.

Dureau is a good fit in our side. His long kicking game gets us on the front foot and playing good field position which is vital (sometimes I think people forget what a huge part of the game this really is - 5 average hit-ups and a great kick is better than 5 strong runs and a poor kick). His long passing gets the ball to Mullen out wider where he is most dangerous. And with the defence worrying about a wide Mullen linking with Paterson/Simpson/Sau, it creates opportunities for Scotty to play it short to a charging forward.

I honestly don't expect Dureau to be winning games with sheer brilliance. I don't expect him to score darting halfback tries. I expect him to make the players around him fulfill their roles, and that is exactly what his organistional skills provide.

 

[roopy]

Next year we don't have Bedsy.
Bedsy does a fair bit of organising the side this year - but next year it is the Scotty show as far as organising is concerned.
His skill all the way through the grades is to mix up the play and take a hell of a lot of good options.
The gameplan he is being given is for him to get the ball out to the guys who do the damage, which means he isn't testing the line or doing any of the clever little kicks and passes he would do if Smith wouldn't drop him for not following the gameplan.

At the end of the day we are talking about a guy with about half a season of firstgrade. At the same stage of his career Kurt Gidley was playing like a busted arse as a playmaker and half of us wanted him hung.

 

[otori]

At least Dureau is young and is properly priced for what he provides to our team. Orford played like crap against the Storm and almost singlehandedly wasted all their advantages in general play. At least if Dureau makes a mistake it's because he's inexperienced and not choking.

 

[Adsy]

Orford is probs on atleast $250K a season more than Dureau too.

 

[Serc]

Another Dureau thread, how fine and dandy...

lol.. dureau has been good the past month and it's been silence out of you karma.. then he has one poor game (his kicking game was still great) and you smell blood in the water and pounce.

This (the last half in particular) says it all for me, I've been happy enough with him lately, and he also has the best long kicking game in the team since Johns.

Which reminds me, just because Dureau doesn't storm the tryline from 5 metres out and land 3 cut out passes for tries and 2 banana kicks per game doesn't mean he's a waste of our time. Given the money he'd probably be on at the moment I'm very stoked we have him to add to names like Gidley and Mullen in the future.

Anyway I want to watch the telecast of the game before I comment much more, but I did notice that Mullo gained 256m from 10 kicks and Dureau 195m from 5 kicks. Yes I know Mullo put in a few short kicks but it still underlines that when it comes to long range kicking, Dureau is still our man.

Standouts from my spot behind the goal posts were Mullo (though a bit up and down), Taufua and Pato.

Finally I have a few pics to contribute! When the chick checking the bags out the front gave me a lecture on "photography is banned" I thought i'd be a bit careful until more people packed in. Anyway here we go:

The boys checking out the pitch during half time of NYC

The view from my spot, 14 rows back

Smithy being interviewed about an hour before the game

The boys warming up

Kurt knocking over the first conversion of the game

 

[Serc]

The boys coming to thank the supporters after the game

Danny coming over to do the same a few mins later

 

[Whats Doing]

Now there was a 16 year old kid (and 5+ years younger than Scott) who played approx 20 minutes of football and during that time chip kicked and almost regathered, went within a bees dick of scoring a try and put through a grubber which resulted in a try.

The Scott reasoning that he has only been in the team for half a season doesn't wash where Rankin demonstrated his raft array of skills in 20 minutes.

The faxt of the matter is that Scott is a long way from most first grade jhalves in ability and I don't see that much improvment in him.

 

[Jobdog]

Some good pics there Serc!