Round 23 v Broncos - Game Day Thread

[Gazzamatta]

Other posters say it and I totally agree. Our side has great heart in defence but our technique is poor. We are continually beaten in the ruck and when in attack rarely struggle to play the ball quickly. Watch other teams. One low tackler with two locking the ball and wrestling the attacker on his back. They then peel off one by one, leg tackler first thereby slowing the play the ball and also allowing the leg defender to return to the defencive line with the other two defenders taking marker positions. Our guys just grab and often end up on the ground with the attacker on top. Its been happening for years and until this changes, success will be fleeting.
BA still has much work to do.

 

[Delboy]

7, 9 & 10 should be priority signings for next year

Even Farah signing would be acceptable as he is the best 9 available by a long way.

Would think the coaching staff should be all over this, if Semi stays , our first choice backline is set. That's the way it looks to me

 

[Chipmunk]

Other posters say it and I totally agree. Our side has great heart in defence but our technique is poor. We are continually beaten in the ruck and when in attack rarely struggle to play the ball quickly. Watch other teams. One low tackler with two locking the ball and wrestling the attacker on his back. They then peel off one by one, leg tackler first thereby slowing the play the ball and also allowing the leg defender to return to the defencive line with the other two defenders taking marker positions. Our guys just grab and often end up on the ground with the attacker on top. Its been happening for years and until this changes, success will be fleeting.
BA still has much work to do.

Losing the battle around the play the ball is entrenched into the DNA of the Eels...We've been f**king woeful at it for over a decade. It's completely unacceptable.

 

[Gazzamatta]

Additionally Robbo and Gutho are very poor kickers of the ball. Its hard to believe how bad Robsons kicking skills are given his experience.
What about something different in attack BA? Most teams do the old run around now days. At least try that.
I strongly believe we need better attack coaching support for BA next season.

 

[Chipmunk]

Additionally Robbo and Gutho are very poor kickers of the ball. Its hard to believe how bad Robsons kicking skills are given his experience.
What about something different in attack BA? Most teams do the old run around now days. At least try that.
I strongly believe we need better attack coaching support for BA next season.

Our poor kicking game is also heavily related to our piss poor speed that we play the ball.

 

[Happy MEel]

Our poor kicking game is also heavily related to our piss poor speed that we play the ball.

And our substandard service from dummy half.

 

[Chipmunk]

Well you would have to assume much better. Why wasn't taka playing? I missed the start of the match I thought he was playing

Because he is heavily injury prone.

 

[Roadrunner]

I miss Peats more than Hayne

 

[Gazzamatta]

I wonder what the score would of been if we had Normie, Scott, Semi and Taks out there?

Obviously it would have been much closer Staggs but it does not excuse the minimal attacking options our team posess and our poor technique in defence and want to play the ball at speed.
When other teams decide to play up tempo footy we struggle.

 

[Happy MEel]

To be fair, we have only played three games without Scott, and they were all away, against teams fighting to make the finals, while we were missing a host of other players. Radradra and Norman were missing in all three games, plus our best player Ma'u was either missing or playing centre. Gutherson and Robson were the halves in all three games. And Jennings was also missing in the first two games Scott missed.

So probably hard to isolate Scott as the sole cause hey? Or to compare him with Watmough's impact in a completely different situation. But I already said Scott is a better defender than Watmough (not by much though - Watmough was quicker off the mark so he brought better line speed, but Scott is safer and wrestles better). We certainly missed him tonight but we missed plenty of other players too.

...and I said that Scott's contribution is greater, regardless of any attacking differences, which is increasingly becoming clearer based on our ability to win games without both players and our loss ratio with them playing.

Don't forget there were plenty of plodders playing last year as well in rounds 20-26 including Kelly, Jo Paulo, Pauli, Robinson, Lussick, Morgan, Faraimo and Toutai

 

[phantom eel]

Our middle defence was pretty poor without Watmough as well.

lol

 

[Happy MEel]

double

 

[Poupou Escobar]

We will need better middle forwards before we will become a team capable of winning the comp.

I'm inclined to agree. Which is why I'm glad we didn't blow our wad on Hayne.

 

[Poupou Escobar]

Onya Wicksy! You won't see Mannah ever doing that.

There's plenty of middle forwards you'll never see doing that.

 

[hindy111]

Much better off with pensioners Robson and DeGois

We are buying a new car.A red one

 

[Poupou Escobar]

There was an option for a half. We tried to low ball him and now he'l be playing in the halves for someone else. Now it looks like we might be stuck with sub par options in 2 of 4 spine positions.

A subpar option for a season is better than the world's costliest supporting half for two years or more.

 

[hindy111]

I wonder what the score would of been if we had Normie, Scott, Semi and Taks out there?

And if they had oates Roberts milford gillet out and played in Parra.

We are also down foran so take hunt out

 

[Poupou Escobar]

He is not captain material. He's just mentally weak.

How would you know whether or not he is weak?

 

[hindy111]

Other posters say it and I totally agree. Our side has great heart in defence but our technique is poor. We are continually beaten in the ruck and when in attack rarely struggle to play the ball quickly. Watch other teams. One low tackler with two locking the ball and wrestling the attacker on his back. They then peel off one by one, leg tackler first thereby slowing the play the ball and also allowing the leg defender to return to the defencive line with the other two defenders taking marker positions. Our guys just grab and often end up on the ground with the attacker on top. Its been happening for years and until this changes, success will be fleeting.
BA still has much work to do.

One bad half of footy with our halves best back and best second rower out and the Playstation coaches comes out of the woods

 

[ash411]

I love how people are able to criticise BA's decisions and recruiting strategy coming from zero experience building and coaching an NRL team.

How do you lot have any idea what the impact of paying overs for Haynes would have on the team? I'm of the opinion that BA probably knows a bit more about it than any of you.