Round 6 v GC Titans

[Number of the Beath]

Jett Liu is another option. Big dude with a good work ethic.

Totally agree with this - he's a big unit who can bend the line. Can't contribute less than Lawrie over his usual 15 minutes.

 

[getsmarty]

Dragons partner with Raising the Bar Foundation for 50-50 Raffle

The Dragons will be partnering with the Raising the Bar Foundation for Friday evening's 50-50 Charity Raffle when the side takes on the Titans at WIN Stadium.

www.dragons.com.au

 

[SnowDragon]

Wow, so much negativity here. I mean I was dejected and frustrated after the match, but at least we are competing in the games. It’s clear what needs to change, I assume Flanno is working on it.

from this year what I want is
1) The team to fight for every game and not get blown off the park. We have to develop and improve our resilience as a team. It feels like we are better than last year, but again We still lack the winner instinct.
2) I want to know if Illias is the answer or not, if not he is into reserves and then gone. This means he gets a long time to show it in my head.
3) I want the juniors to be given a go so we can decide who to keep. 2 great examples so far in Stewart and Egan. I want to see a few more before the end of the year. I know we can’t play them every game, we need to rotate at some point. I know we need some old heads aren’t them to protect and guide. So not too many at once.
4) where does Kyle play? Is he a 6? (Atkinson?) a 7? a 9? Or a 14? Or is he in reserves as back up?
5) is there a role for LKT? For me this only happens if Atkinson becomes a 7. I think Reed could be there ping term, but he and Glover are young and are just pipeline atm. young guys like him will not wait around and you can’t really blame them. Flanno needs to make lots of calls, and they start with the evaluation of Kyle and Illias (Hence this is 100% current focus for me, even at the expense of wins).
6) I want to see Sloan develop And if not then we make the hard call on him. (I’m more positive than most, I’ve seen him physically improve, and still see him as a superstar for us, but at some point we can’t pay on potential)
7) I’d love to see that Cody can come back into 1st grade in 26 or 27 as our fullback. This year he has already exceeded expectation, but physically can he make 1st grade?

I guess I see this as short term pain to work out the long term of the club.

 

[Number of the Beath]

Saints wingers for 2025 should have been Tamale (who is killing it at the Raiders) and Finau (every game he has played for Saints, he has been excellent, he even scored 4 in the Charity Shield), yet Saints have Tui and Sloan. The Saints backline can be so much more deadly. Moses Suli is another. Good for the bash and barge stuff but put him in the clear and he will be caught. Not the fastest centre and for his size we wait a while to see a good off load to his winger. He shoudl be doing it more often.

I was a big fan of Sloan but since he made his debut we have seen guys like Bula, Weekes, Kini & Jye Grey. They have all become great NRL standard fullbacks whilst Sloan stays on the wing. The Parra winger Iongi looks like he will be a star and was one of Parra's best.

Whoever is looking at retention (probably Flanno), is simply letting the wrong players leave and keeping the ones he shouldn't. Bostock is also another killing it.

Saints cannot afford to lose guys like Finau and Buchanan for the likes of Tui, Sloan and Feagai. If I was Finau I would be seriously pi$$ed watching Sloan and Feagai get picked ahead of him. He will end up leaving like Tamale whilst Saints will look to continue with another 100 games of Sloan and Feagai to see if they become consistent NRL players at age 26.

I'm still spewing that we let Schiller and Wishart slip through our fingers.
Dumb club.

 

[jeffdragon]

I'm still spewing that we let Schiller and Wishart slip through our fingers.
Dumb club.

Schiller hasn't been a loss.

 

[jeffdragon]

We all need to calm down on the flanno bashing . I think flanno is not rushing anything giving time for the team to gel and letting some rookies more time in NSW cup. Instead of chopping and changing maybe it’s best for the nsw cup team to build up some combos to?This is a development and building season. This year we are not competing for the comp not matter what team we have out there. So I Agree 100% with this weeks team selections

Make the 8 was rhe goal.

If you don't perform it's out.he door.

 

[denis preston]

Ilias needs a spell in KoE. Or at Arncliffe Scots, if he's up to it. He's had a good go and he's played a total of 40 minutes of good footy. (2nd half v Melbourne)
LKT to 6, K Flan to 7, Liddle to 9, Cook to 13, JdB to the front row with Couchman. Klemmer, Stewart, Luc and Pacifiki-Tonga as bench. Egan & Su'a second row. Sloan out, Finau in.
And when Guler returns he goes to KoE.
K Flan & Tui under notice to perform or get the tap. Glover & Lawson are ready imo.
Lawrie to just get the tap. Is it too late to loan him out?!

Not bad, but Glover & Lawson not the answer. Ones defense is just not up to NRL standard & the other has done absolutely nothing to deserve promption.

 

[getsmarty]

Gutherson: 'We know the team we can be and want to be'

Captain Clint Gutherson speaks with the media ahead of our Round 6 game against the Titans.

www.dragons.com.au

 

[bathtime]

Disagree. I’m still behind Flanno but the Lawrie selection just baffles me. He offers NOTHING.
You can’t argue ‘experience” because his ”experience” didn’t help last game. In fact I’d argue his slowness cost us metres both in attack and defence in the losing stages of the last game when we couldn’t buy field position.
Stewart and Egan have done their jobs well. Couchman has looked 100% at home in first grade since his debut. All 3 of these young guns have outperformed Lawrie.
I absolutely refuse to believe that one of the next young guns in line can’t do a better job than Lawrie. Make their tackles, run hard. Even if they play the same low minutes they HAVE to offer more

Disagree. I’m still behind Flanno but the Lawrie selection just baffles me. He offers NOTHING.
You can’t argue ‘experience” because his ”experience” didn’t help last game. In fact I’d argue his slowness cost us metres both in attack and defence in the losing stages of the last game when we couldn’t buy field position.
Stewart and Egan have done their jobs well. Couchman has looked 100% at home in first grade since his debut. All 3 of these young guns have outperformed Lawrie.
I absolutely refuse to believe that one of the next young guns in line can’t do a better job than Lawrie. Make their tackles, run hard. Even if they play the same low minutes they HAVE to offer more.

Thats why his nickname is"the Nothing" yelling "go the Nothing" at games is something.

 

[bathtime]

Wow, so much negativity here. I mean I was dejected and frustrated after the match, but at least we are competing in the games. It’s clear what needs to change, I assume Flanno is working on it.

from this year what I want is
1) The team to fight for every game and not get blown off the park. We have to develop and improve our resilience as a team. It feels like we are better than last year, but again We still lack the winner instinct.
2) I want to know if Illias is the answer or not, if not he is into reserves and then gone. This means he gets a long time to show it in my head.
3) I want the juniors to be given a go so we can decide who to keep. 2 great examples so far in Stewart and Egan. I want to see a few more before the end of the year. I know we can’t play them every game, we need to rotate at some point. I know we need some old heads aren’t them to protect and guide. So not too many at once.
4) where does Kyle play? Is he a 6? (Atkinson?) a 7? a 9? Or a 14? Or is he in reserves as back up?
5) is there a role for LKT? For me this only happens if Atkinson becomes a 7. I think Reed could be there ping term, but he and Glover are young and are just pipeline atm. young guys like him will not wait around and you can’t really blame them. Flanno needs to make lots of calls, and they start with the evaluation of Kyle and Illias (Hence this is 100% current focus for me, even at the expense of wins).
6) I want to see Sloan develop And if not then we make the hard call on him. (I’m more positive than most, I’ve seen him physically improve, and still see him as a superstar for us, but at some point we can’t pay on potential)
7) I’d love to see that Cody can come back into 1st grade in 26 or 27 as our fullback. This year he has already exceeded expectation, but physically can he make 1st grade?

I guess I see this as short term pain to work out the long term of the club.

Well thought out. we coulda, shoulda won at least one between parra and souths but we didnt get blown away. Comments re Ilias, Sloan and KF all spot on.

 

[Sloan Ranger]

Make the 8 was rhe goal.

If you don't perform it's out.he door.

And replaced with who?
Anything above 10th is a good result for our roster.

 

[JohnnoMcJohnno]

For the second time this year, I'm tipping the opposition. I've lost faith in Ilias - he's played over 50 first grade games and never done much. I've lost faith in Sloane - he's not a first grade winger, he's not a first grade fullback, he's not a first grade anything. I've lost faith in Cookie - he only ever went OK behind a monster pack of forwards which we don't have. I have no faith in Lawrie and Luc, their only value is the Titans may get tired by how far they have to run to get around them. We have 2 gun players but Val Holmes looks disinterested and Gutho can't keep carrying the side. Our stand-back-and-let-them-run-to-us defence worked spectacularly in the wet but it's useless in the dry. Titans have enough forward power and backline clout to run over us at the back end of the game. Good luck Dragons, prove me wrong.

 

[jeffdragon]

And replaced with who?
Anything above 10th is a good result for our roster.

Well he is in charge now.
We were in the 8 with 2 weeks to go.
Coach said wed be better well thats making the 8 fior me.
Had a chance to sign a few forwards and passed.

 

[Crush]

For the second time this year, I'm tipping the opposition. I've lost faith in Ilias - he's played over 50 first grade games and never done much. I've lost faith in Sloane - he's not a first grade winger, he's not a first grade fullback, he's not a first grade anything. I've lost faith in Cookie - he only ever went OK behind a monster pack of forwards which we don't have. I have no faith in Lawrie and Luc, their only value is the Titans may get tired by how far they have to run to get around them. We have 2 gun players but Val Holmes looks disinterested and Gutho can't keep carrying the side. Our stand-back-and-let-them-run-to-us defence worked spectacularly in the wet but it's useless in the dry. Titans have enough forward power and backline clout to run over us at the back end of the game. Good luck Dragons, prove me wrong.

So not confident?

 

[baggygreen man]

Couchman to the bench

..and kill our golden goose. Toby has been outstanding as our starting bookend. Playing big mins and producing big results.

Why are numbers 9,8 and 11 blank in KOE Cup? Hopefully Lawrie takes the 8View attachment 100775

Jake H has been playing #11. Injured? Dead set far prefer this big chunky dude came off the bench to crunch lazy or tired markers. I see him as a future middle tbh.

 

[baggygreen man]

i thought he hated him

Where did you hear this? Flannos credibility is dwindling. His son has yet to hit his straps this season yet is picked every week. But there is more to this father/son situation as some speculation that Flanno Jr does not like Sione Finau, reason his old man bannished him for Sloan who has barely played wing. If true, this is playing favorites and is underhand and should not be tolerated by our BOD.

 

[BrissieDragons]

Where did you hear this? Flannos credibility is dwindling with his making odd selections. His son has yet to hit his straps this season yet is picked every week. But there is more to this father/son situation as some speculation that Flanno Jr does not like Sione Finau, reason he did not start the season and why Sloan and CT have been the starting wingers. This is playing favorites and is underhand and should not be tolerated by our BOD.

I thought this got to do with their players salaries and influence from the players managers? The higher the salary of the player the more likely they need to play.

 

[since77]

I think some of the criticism of Cook has been a bit over the top. Yes he’s done some dumb things late in second halves under fatigue. That’s why Liddle needs to be used smarter - and earlier.
Cook’s service in the first half of all of our games has been quite good and has been a large part of why we’ve mostly been doing well in first halves of all of our games so far.
It’s in the second half where Flanno needs to get better at using both Liddle and Cook. And quickly.

 

[RedVDave]

I read an article today saying Ilias has had 1 try assist and run for 56 metres in all his games this season. I knew he sucked but didn't realise he sucked to this extent. Just play Lykhan or Glover already Tigpies rushed Galvin in FG in it's paid dividends for them.

 

[st.phil]

I read an article today saying Ilias has had 1 try assist and run for 56 metres in all his games this season. I knew he sucked but didn't realise he sucked to this extent. Just play Lykhan or Glover already Tigpies rushed Galvin in FG in it's paid dividends for them.

agree re Lykhan but he's off contract and looks like that ship is sailing to the eels. Glover from all ive seen is an Adam Clune v2 - skip a gen and go to Kade Reed after round 11 if you wanna "do a Galvin" - he is the only elite young half we have on our books that looks like hanging around