Round 23 vs. North Queensland Cowboys Discussion

[Big Pete]

North Queensland Cowboys vs. Brisbane Broncos
Queensland Country Bank Stadium, Saturday 10 August 2024
Kick Off: 5:30pm

1. Scott Drinkwater 2. Kyle Feldt 3. Valentine Holmes 4. Viliami Vailea 5. Murray Taulagi 6. Tom Dearden 7. Chad Townsend 8. Jordan McLean 9. Reece Robson 10. Sam McIntyre 11. Heilum Luki 24. Jeremiah Nanai 13. Reuben Cotter

14. Harrison Edwards 15. Thomas Mikaele 16. Kulikefu Finefeuiaki 17. Griffin Neame

18. Jaxon Purdue 19. Jake Clifford 20. Tomas Chester 21. Semi Valemei 22. Marly Bitungane

1. Reece Walsh 2. Josiah Karapani 3. Kotoni Staggs 4. Deine Mariner 5. Jesse Arthars 6. Joshua Rogers 7. Adam Reynolds 8. Corey Jensen 9. Billy Walters 10. Xavier Willison 11. Brendan Piakura 12. Jordan Riki 13. Patrick Carrigan

14. Blake Mozer 15. Kobe Hetherington 16. Tristan Sailor 17. Martin Taupau

18. Cory Paix 19. Benjamin Te Kura 20. Jaiyden Hunt 21. Corey Oates 22. Vaa Semu​

 

[Big Pete]

The season is in tatters for the Broncos and Kevie is coaching for his career. Without Cobbo (personal), Mam (ankle), Haas (foot), Smoothy (ankle) the assignment only becomes more difficult as the season winds to a disappointing close. He can ill afford to throw in the towel and desperately needs results otherwise management will be left with little choice.

The team list doesn't inspire much confidence. I hope that backline ends up:

LW. Jesse Arthars
LC. Josiah Karaipani
RC. Kotoni Staggs
RW. Deine Mariner

Because I think the Mariner at left centre experiment clearly needed to be re-thought after back to back 40+ defeats.

Otherwise Kevie's hands are tied. The Broncos have a bad injury toll and their depth is virtually non-existent. The only position where they have any depth is dummy half and the elephant in the room is Billy Walters. Unfortunately Tyson Smoothy suffered an ankle injury playing for the Magpies so he couldn't come straight in and Paix is on the outer at the club. If I wanted to send a message, at the very least I would have started Mozer and benched Billy just to send a message.

If there is one positive, it's nice to see Te Kura named. The Broncos need to find some value out of these remaining games, so giving Te Kura some time in the middle and giving Willison or one of the young charges a spell would be welcome.

 

[MRN]

Dead right about Mariner. He needs to be our most improved player in 2025 or I'll consider the Mariner experiment completely over.
Don't like Sailor on the bench. Give Te Kura another run or Semu a debut.
Season maybe over but 'The' QLD derby is always worth aiming up for, regardless of either teams form and/or ladder position, so I hope the boys have a good, 80 minute performance.

 

[Showtime]

I agree about Mozer, if he’s not starting at least give him a decent stint every game for the rest of the year. Do we have any depth in the 2nd row? I’m getting sick of watching Riki getting picked because he’s good on the kick chase because he offers f**k all outside of that.

 

[Showtime]

I’d like to see Walsh not lay down after every tackle.

 

[Big Pete]

I agree about Mozer, if he’s not starting at least give him a decent stint every game for the rest of the year. Do we have any depth in the 2nd row? I’m getting sick of watching Riki getting picked because he’s good on the kick chase because he offers f**k all outside of that.

None.

In 2022, the Broncos had Capewell, Riki, Robati, Piakura with Hosking as a back-up.

Now they have Piakura and Riki with Gosiewski as a last minute emergency signing.

It was really piss poor planning in a position that requires depth. If nothing else, it highlights Kevie's blasse attitude and lack of forward thinking.

Broncos fans have been begging for Patston to get a go. Josh played during the trials and has a decent skill-set but his conditioning leaves something to be desired. Still, I find it strange that Walters didn't sign him and/or Coburn on training deals just to have that depth.

 

[MRN]

I'm going to savor that one. Especially when the boss is a Cowboys supporter. Great second half. First half a bit choppy but halftime score was generous to the Cowboys with the Dearden try clearly never reaching the line.
But all in all great game. Great to get the win in 'The' QLD Derby.

 

[blaza88z]

I thought that was one of our best games this year, we've had games where we dominate early and we win the game in the first half but this wasn't one of those, we had to wrestle back momentum and we had to do it defensively. The challenge will be if we can do it against Parra and Dolphins but I think it was one of our better performances this season.

 

[renouf]

Funny how we seem to go better when Haas isn't in the side.

 

[Big Pete]

Brisbane Broncos 42 (Kotoni Staggs 2, Corey Jensen, Deine Mariner, Josh Rogers, Jordan Riki, Xavier Willison tries; Adam Reynolds 7/7 goals) def. North Queensland Cowboys 18

9-12

Won't call it a comeback, but the Broncos showed they still have points in them. At 18-6, it looked like the Cowboys were going to run away with it. However after they failed to find touch on a penalty and two blown tries, the Broncos were able to claw their way back in and just had too much strike.

Kotoni Staggs was a deserved Carl Webb medalist. It was easily his best game of the season and a reminder of what he's capable of on his day. I thought Reece Walsh bounced back and showed a lot more maturity with the football. It was Walsh's chase on Rogers' kick that led to points, then later in the game his decision to cut back in-field gave Staggs just enough space down the edge to dummy and go himself.

It's not exactly high IQ footy, but it shows he's learning. If he can fix some other areas like marking the ball in-goal he'll live up to the hype.

Thought the young guys in Deine Mariner, Xavier Willison, Josiah Karaipani and Blake Mozer all made positive contributions. Still plenty to work on but you can see the touch of class and Brisbane ought to lock Willison and Mozer down sooner rather than later.

The only other point that comes to mind is that we didn't see much of Sailor. I believe he came on right at the death when Walsh was puking his guts out on the sideline. Hopefully after the bye, we can get another forward on there either in Te Kura or Baker. I'd love to see Mozer combine with Te Kura to send the season out.

 

[Frank_Grimes]

Errors, errors, errors. 14 (15 according to NRL.com.au) total for the match with an almost even spread across the two halves. It has been the common theme of the losing streak - gifting the ball to the opposition and piling pressure on themselves.

It doesn't seem like ball handling skills - it seems so much more like rash options and unnecessary all or nothing passes.