Parramatta suffer their normal shaky start to the season. Going into Round 7 they are 2 from 4 but still in the hunt for the 8 and have shown some good form.
Round 7 we play the Cowboys in North Queensland on a Friday night. The team travels north on Thursday and are in the skies around midday, when the Melbourne Salary cap rort is discovered.
Afterwards we play the Cowboys Friday night and win. We then Back up for a game against the Bulldogs and win going into a bye, we are sitting 7th and 6th after the bye weekend.
We play the Sea Eagles on a Monday night and win playing some of our best football so far.
Round 11 sees us lose narrowly to the Sharks minus our Origin stars and Round 12 sees us lose to the Dragons this time quite convincingly, away and 2 nights after Origin.
Round 13, is the turning point of the season. We play the Storm at Home, in a game I am sure most remember. A war that had Jarryd Hayne butting heads with Billy Slater, I described the game as a war. We go into the round 14 bye in 8th and drop to 9th during the bye.
After that the loss to the Knights on a Monday at Newcastle With the Knights scoring and converting with 2 minutes to go to win by 2.
We lose to the Broncos at home during Women in League round Lockyer playing game 329. before we are well beaten by the Warriors at home minus Hayne and Mannah on Origin duty.
We then win 3 on the trot and stay 10th on the ladder, one win away from the top 8 or indeed equal to them for one round. Including that stellar game where Hayne cut the top performing Panthers to shreds.
The Roosters smash us before we start or South East Queensland trip, we play the Titans and lose by 20 but the result should have been closer with a few costly mistakes near the try line leading to tries 6 tackles latter at the other end of the field we were a sniff the game with 5 to go.
Then the press starts talking during the week that Paul Osbourne has flown to Melbourne for Talks with the Melbourne Assistant Steven Kearny.
That Thursday, I catch Paul, Roy, Dezzi, Jarryd Hayne and a bloke wearing a beanie at a pub that Roy and Dezzi own. The bloke I find out is Quade Cooper.
We beat the Broncos after Mortimer is dropped and Antony Mitchell is bought in.
By then the talk is rampant that DA will be replaced and that SK is the new coach unless the team make the 8.
We then lose due to a missed penalty goal against the Tigers at Parramatta stadium which would have seen us into the 8.
That sees the end, we were a sniff to all but the press writes us off after that game. The Tigers go on to finish 3rd equal on points with the Panthers and the Titans and the last two games against the Rabbitohs and Warriors seal the coaches fate.
They werent bad, they were unlucky and in my opinion jaded from the Storm news. They won their grand final in round 13 and the hangover from that win saw them lose focus on the pitch and drop a few important games (Newcastle away, Titans Away, Tigers home)
I would have loved to have seen DA work that out of them during the off season.
