Match Discussion: Round 5 vs Canterbury @ Accor Stadium, Sydney Olympic Park / Wanngal

[Woody90]

Almost the biggest black eye the club has ever had is not being able to put a decent spine around this guy. It's been what, 7 years? Utter incompetence at every level of management.

Ponga didn’t do enough tonight to deserve to put on a pedestal.

 

[Walk On Home Boy]

Dogs haven’t even been that good

we were just that poor

I stand by the call that anyone else beats them. That was a free 2 points for the Dogs tonight.

 

[Apey]

Pongas been phoning it in the last couple of rounds.

I'm more mad at the general team today though. Just dreadful with the ball.

 

[perverse]

Pongas been phoning it in the last couple of rounds.

I'm more mad at the general team today though. Just dreadful with the ball.

His last 2 games have been his 2 worst games in the past 2-3 years. This after starting the season red hot, too. It doesn't make a lot of sense honestly.

It must be deflating to be out the back of so many plays that just die at first receiver though. He's getting paid to rise above that, but I would have the shits too by now. Actually what am I saying, I *do* have the shits right now.

 

[Walk On Home Boy]

Ponga didn’t do enough tonight to deserve to put on a pedestal.

It's not about tonight. It's about the collective biggest problem the club has had since Joey retired; recruitment or lack thereof. In particular the lack of a quality spine. Ponga at his best can (and has) lift this brain dead spine and the rest of the side to victory on his own. Imagine he had just a little tiny bit of help. Right now he has zero. Zip. Zilch. Sfa. Leadership is also a massive issue. We have none at all.

I'm confident the club finally has the management to turn that around but will it be too late? Pongas prime is now and if he's not on, we don't win. Only Jonhs could do it on his own, no one else.

 

[Yosh]

Hopefully Ponga can get AOB fired!

 

[SamSepi0l]

Hopefully Ponga can get AOB fired!

We're not doing this again.

 

[Walk On Home Boy]

I wish we didn't win those 10 games in a row. Why did we extend AOB? Why!!!

It was fun but yeah...a lot of us saw the potential wolf in sheep's clothing. The club re signed a coach based on the good form of one player.

 

[Apey]

His last 2 games have been his 2 worst games in the past 2-3 years. This after starting the season red hot, too. It doesn't make a lot of sense honestly.

It must be deflating to be out the back of so many plays that just die at first receiver though. He's getting paid to rise above that, but I would have the shits too by now. Actually what am I saying, I *do* have the shits right now.

When did Brown sign? Almost comes across like he's just given up until 2026. Same, to be fair. Not good enough though.

 

[Woody90]

His last 2 games have been his 2 worst games in the past 2-3 years. This after starting the season red hot, too. It doesn't make a lot of sense honestly.

It must be deflating to be out the back of so many plays that just die at first receiver though. He's getting paid to rise above that, but I would have the shits too by now. Actually what am I saying, I *do* have the shits right now.

In the first 2 games KP was playing a lot of first receiver and we looked good, now we’ve gone back to just sitting him on the back of shape.

 

[perverse]

When did Brown sign? Almost comes across like he's just given up until 2026. Same, to be fair. Not good enough though.

We need a change in the halves, it's that simple. Whether it's Phoenix or Gamble, it has to happen next week. There's no way possible to select Cogger based on the first 4 games. You just can't. It has to be the last first grade football he's played. This is so embarrassing.

In the first 2 games KP was playing a lot of first receiver and we looked good, now we’ve gone back to just sitting him on the back of shape.

Honestly, I think it's just because so many plays keep dying with the halfback that it doesn't even allow us to get in a rhythm. We then panic and do stupid shit. Rinse and repeat. It all started with some injuries and the sins of the 7 tonight. The rest of the rot set in from those wretched seeds.

 

[Lynoman]

Cogger is a dead weight.

 

[SamSepi0l]

In the first half Ponga was spraying Cogger for his play.

 

[alexwilliams_66692007]

Pongas been phoning it in the last couple of rounds.

I'm more mad at the general team today though. Just dreadful with the ball.

He's taking up way too much of our salary cap to be phoning it in.

God help us when we play them at full strength.

 

[perverse]

Cogger is a dead weight.

He's worse than dead weight. Dead weight implies it's just hanging off you, flaccidly. Cogger is more like having a beligerant child tied to you with a rope that is constantly fighting to run in the opposite direction.

 

[Walk On Home Boy]

A few times in the first half you could see Ponga getting frustrated. He looked to give Best a spray when he lazily allowed the winger to kick around him, resulting in a drop out.

Imo it's more of a bad sign than anything. Ponga isn't a leader. This type of frustration is what could see him walk away and if he does, the blame lays entirely at the feet of everyone responsible for recruitment over the last 7-8 years. It wouldn't surprise me at all if the Brown signing was pushed by Ponga. I imagine being the only guy who can win games would be frustrating no matter how big your salary is. The pay might be good but I'm sure he still wants to win something and have more to show at the end of his career than a couple of nice houses.

 

[Lynoman]

The attacking team being caught in the air, rule change is the dumbest, stupidest rule ever introduced. Teams are supposed to allow attackers to score over tackling them? It was bought in to stop chasers taking out an airbourne defender, to apply it to an attacking team is moronic!

 

[Loose Cannon]

Somehow, we have a premiership winning half, and a 4-time winning coach, yet fail to score points repeatedly.

Who is reading their CV’s? Short attention span is obvious.

 

[Mr_Knightside]

Honestly I know we were garbage with the ball in hand tonight but you’ve gotta put a lot of that down to fatigue. The game was practically un-winnable from the start with us being down to 15 players from the 2nd minute. Looking at the stats our forwards played huge minutes…

Leo 72 mins
Friz 66 mins
Elliott 76 mins
Croker 56 mins
Cant 80 mins at centre
McEwen 80 mins

We had Jacob ruled out immediately and Hetherington went off with 30 to go due to a shoulder injury after only playing 19 mins so that’s two middles out of action for a significant chunk of the game so everyone had to lift more than their fair share, there were some sets where the backs were doing all the running because the forwards weren’t even back in the line yet.

Yeah we should have done better with ball in hand but fatigue and the overall game situation played a huge part in that. Not to mention the Dogs’ defence is unbelievable at the moment. Their kick chase is just relentless and it seems like there aren’t any chinks in the armour. There are better teams than us that will figure out how to beat them but some team will need to play outstanding for 80 mins to do it.

If this was a normal game without some pretty ridiculous circumstances and we still played like that I’d feel worse about it.

That being said AOB should be concerned that we’ve now been held scoreless in 3 out of our last 4 halves of football.

Another area of concern is quite a few players went on report so we could have another few outs in addition to the injuries.

 

[Walk On Home Boy]

Good news is I think it improves drastically if we just get Cogger out and Gamble in. Just having another player who can not only create something but not be a handbrake on every play is going to be huge.

Unfortunately we offer no threat at 9 either. Crossland is nothing more than a bench utility and that's obvious. I'm not sure what the answer is there for this season.