I’d drop Aitken for Wiliame but Aitken probably deserves to see out the year for the service he has given to the club though not necessarily the wingers outside him. He made Nightingale look average.
We have seen the selections which was clearly unremarkable so now it gets down to game plan and management that must be vastly different otherwise why sack Mc Fookknuckle? If that doesn’t change and markedly then woe betide us all. I have been led to believe that one of the major gripes / criticisms was that training was equally hard as game day for physicality so fatigue was an underlying factor so if that gets adjusted then much more energy in game day. I must admit many times i thought we looked leg weary just running out so the next fortnight will tell us a lot. Fingers crossed.
Being the Dragons we will probably lose this match. When was the last time we played a dominant 80 minutes of footy against a shit team. I remember numerous times over the past few years playing terrible against teams we should easily beat. Remember a few years back when both the Dogs and Eels killed us at Kogarah. Last year so many disappointing performances. This year around 3 & 4. We should flog these guys by 40 but knowing us we will somehow lose by 2. Cmon Saints, let’s play fast, hard and energetic.
I like your team (except for Aiken), I’d rather play Host, Willame or even Norman there. But the thing that scares me the most... is the ability we have in playing teams into form. I truly hope we turn up and play for the 80 mins.
Just remember who is Pereira is playing outside of.... ‘old tuck it under the arm and run’. Aitken is not a centre. He doesn’t set up is outside man.
Well there is nothing remarkable about the team Young selected this week. I am of the opinion he is just another Mary and the sooner we find a decent coach the better.
Nightingale's penultimate season scored 16 tries outside Lafai. In his last year he scored one try before injury finished his season prematurely. Aitkin was the centre inside him. Says it all really.
. Lafai usually on the LHS had a flick pass But he generally played on RHS outside Euan. EA can pass to the right but not the left I believe.
He was still great at making metres out of our end though, something our wingers get a lot of practice at.
This is the kind of match McGregor coached sides always lost over the last few seasons. Will be interesting to see what the side dishes up this week.
I prefer Sailor not be selected as a bench player. He either comes in for Norman or is left out of the side altogether. I believe that four forwards on the bench provides balance to the run on team. We have small players in the forwards as well as the backs and our bigger forwards need to be rotated more frequently than would be the case if we had a big pack that could assert themselves over the opposition.
We traditionally struggle against team with lots of offloads and quick play the balls in them. If the Broncos start offloading in the middle I expect they will be more than a handful to contain. If any of our outside backs start coming up and in they will burn us for pace out wide. So it will be interesting to see what style we adopt in both attack and defence as obviously accordingly to our staff that is what the problem is and not the players themselves. So much will become evident over the next couple of weeks and it will at least be interesting and hopefully exciting to watch.
Your post is insightful. We had the same issue with Mann on the bench and as much as I was fan of his that selection totally unbalanced the side. A back is either in the side or not and the bench needs to be the home of the guys that have to provide the grunt to get us going forward that the backs can play off.
Thanks OT. I could not work out why they bought Mann. It was if they recognised that he was a good player, but failed to gave any thought to what position he would fill.
Are you setting things up for some Young praise after Friday nights game? It was calculated that Young was installed as coach for these 3 easy games to give him the best chance to win the position of head coach. If Saints don't win, it will underline that nothing has changed. If they do win, it is an easy game against a team in shambles.
