To beat a side coached by the great man Wayne Bennett, the greatest in the modern era, means that your team has the game to go all the way. For the first time in 9 weeks, Parramatta turned off the heat in defence and paid the price with a towel up of 37 points.
The Dragons had some wonderful assistance from the geese with the whistles, but their win was well deserved. I just wonder if Wayne has worked his magic into the club in such a short time, concerning finals football, and their disasterous statistics at SFS and ANZ over the years, with the number 37 coming up again, only winning 37% of their games at these grounds, a statistic that will haunt and be in the back of these guys minds.
A certain front rower who is at Parramatta next year had a blinder the other night, and I believe he will receive a return of serve on Sunday, and be in a very unfamiliar situation from the previous week. The day of truth will be Sunday for the Dragons, as their underbelly has been exposed in previous weeks, and we let them off the hook, with a horrible defensive effort, and some seriously ordinary attack, as we waited for it instead of working for it, leaving us one out, and easy shots for the Dragon defence.
Semi Finals are a different competition all together, referees will not penalise blokes for what they were getting pinged for in the normal competition rounds, and those who push the envelope win, and those who whinge end up looking at next week. Players who you believe are good team players stand up and become legends, and skill is put aside until the courage and character of that player surfaces, some shine and some fail horridly, but that is finals football.
St George deserve to be favourites for what they have achieved this week, but that is no longer in calculation from this point on, as their past record in finals and their 3 weeks of horror is going to be their yardstick, but can they get their heads around it. St George will be there after this weekend, but so will Parramatta, and after the scores on the weekend, anyone can win this competition, and before last Friday night no one wanted to play the Eels, and after this Sunday, no one will want to play them again.
Sevens.
