Ironic , isnt it, Cross is out, and Royal is out, and sarge would have been straight in. But he is gone also, there is still White who I rate, and Tafua, but the problem now is they have to gel with the squad and get combinations going with Tolar and other forwards, which is hard when the PL guys dont always train with the NRL side. I feel sorry for Royal as now he can't prove his value to the club during negotiations even though I feel he has done plenty to justify retention, can't imagine how he is feeling right now, there can't be that much money left after signing De Gois anyway so he probably knows what they have left and it wouldn't be much, I heard he has been told to put his feelers out to other clubs, but they also have spent there money, so he is pushed into a corner. It looks as though Brian Smith is confident that so long as there implementing his game plan they will win with the players he puts on the park. But there attack has deteriorated a bit and there defence starts on par with the opposition but losers its sting quite alot getting into the game, which is contrary to early in the season. What has changed?? They worked hard on it in the pre season and it is showing how dropping it off considerably has affected it, and that is understandable as recovery is important for the next round which isn't an issue in the pre season but some of the things they were doing need to be brought back in to the program more then they are doing right now, apparently they spend very little time on it. I was confident the depth of players this year was skillful enough to do the job to make the finals, so it's not entirely the teams fault,I reckon there are players not on the field that should be. I think aku could have made good contributions to the game, he might be raw but, he has flare and his explosive pace could have made use of the open space out wide that was there at times and honestly I would put him on the wing before Sau, I think there is gonna be issues for him and Vuna under the highball from here on as they have been exposed already and aren't the tallest timber in the forest. White is a heavy front rower who also I thought would have contributed against a beefy pack the Dragons had. And tafua has much better go forward then a couple of forwars on the park. It's still possible for them to be there in the end but my hopes are fading fast.
