Agreed fully Angry.
The subtle parts of the Hooking skill are what SHAPES entire football teams and their character, their styles.
HOw often have we said this year, out forwards lacked mongrel, our defence stood and let the attack come to them, we were flat in attack, flat footed, no go forward, bad kick chase etc etc ?
Yet we CAN obviously do all of these things right AT TIMES, sometimes we even do more than one of those right for the most part of 80mins, as seen in brissy, and we win and look fantastic in doing so.
This ALL stems from the Hooker in my opinion, a much under rated skill and one which the modern game is losing, shove any all fast bloke in there to make breaks when the forwards tire......that is only a SMALL part of the hooking role and one which the good 80 minute hookers of old could do anyway. Elias, Walters, etc.
THe hooker at dummy half gets our pack going, he shames them into making another hit up, "come on knuckles, this next ones yours, make the effort ! " etc etc he times his passes to have the pack running onto them and going forward, he steers the rucks until the 3rd or 4th tackle when the room has been made and the half can then work his magic. He SHAPES the character of the team, if the Hooker is up and keen and gutsy, then the pack sure as hell will be too.
Then, when he has toiled the pack for the set of six, he LEADS the kick chase, he talks the entire time and makes sure his quick outside backs are in line with him, invariably he makes the tackle on the fullback around the legs and is jumping up to act as marker, long before the opposing winger has even had time to get into dummy half.
Now it is the Hookers turn to make the defencive set of 6 COUNT !
He will make an extra effort to chase the fast winger from dummy half on the Zero tackle, grab him by the jumper and hang the hell on, or his bootlaces, whatever, but he will make sure it isn't a cheap few metres that is gained, all this whilst the opposing pack is still a long way off getting back onside to have some hit ups.
He often makes the second tackle of the set too, before falling back into the defencive line on tackles 2 3 and 4 whilst the attacking team starts to throw it wider than the one hit up out of trouble.
Then on the 5th, the hooker will ENSURE he is at first or at least second marker ( how often this season are we caught with 2nd rowers at marker on the 5th ? ) so as to hassle and chase the opposing teams Star Half, he will do this 9/10 sets in the match, never letting the halfback have a moments piece on the 5th tackle, forcing them to often use their 2nd kicker of take rushed options, often resulting in a less than perfect kicking game and giving our team a huge leg up for the following set.....
Then, once our fullback and wingers have taken the zero and first tackles of the set in kick return, our Hooker will be back at Dummy Half to again lift the pack and guide them to a good set of six...before kick chasing again......etc , etc etc
For 80 minutes.
Subtle things, but done well,, constantly, annoyingly ( for the opposition), with a pride in their job that only genuine hookers have, over 80 minutes of football, SHAPE a team and WIN matches for teams.
Yep, you all know I am a Treister fan, but it has to be said he did this for us week in week out, late in his career people were critical saying he didn't break the game open for us, didnt make busts from dummy half enough etc etc, but he did ALL that above and broke games by doing that many many times. Woolford does the same for the raiders, Senter was good at it at the tiges, buderus still does it well.
