Year in Review - 2018

[Jono078]

So, it's all done and dusted. What are your thoughts on the year that was? I just wanted to share some random thoughts/facts which some may find surprising (or not).

1. Our depth was tested this year and was shown to be really poor. As soon as a regular went down we really struggled with the replacements. When we could field our top 17 I would say we were competitive in most games.

2. Our attack ranked 3rd worst in the NRL this year (behind the Tigers and Eels) - We also finsihed 3rd last in this department last season.

3. We finished LAST in points conceded for the 3RD YEAR IN A ROW - this was my biggest disappointment for the year. It's been 5 years since we finished with an average of less than 20 points conceded per game;

2013 - 17.6 (5th)
2014 - 23.8 (12th)
2015 - 25.5 (15th)
2016 - 33.3 (16th)
2017 - 26.8 (16th)
2018 - 25.3 (16th)

This is where I find it very hard to stomach and to king of see this season as a pass mark. It's great we didn't finish last but I expected a bit more of an improvement in this department.

Feel free to share your thoughts, but those are the ones on my mind which I wanted to share.

 

[slotmachine]

Last in metres conceded.
Last in run metres (gap from us to 15th is the same as the gap from 15th to 3rd!).

Ponga was fun to watch and Pearce is class.

All the new buys were amongst our best so Mooney gets a gold star.

 

[Burwood]

It's hard to disagree with our defensive problems. Only two times this year did teams put 40+ points on us. Unlike many other teams, there were no games where we conceded 50+ points. So considering that we didn't have lots of blow outs throughout the season, we can't blame our poor defence on a handful of games skewing the stats. We just performed piss poorly for the entire year, and I find that a really concerning considering Brown has had plenty of time at the club to get structures into place.

All we can hope for next year is a forward pack that doesn't lose the battle in the middle every week. That'll go a long way towards fixing the problem.

 

[Yosh]

Some stats are still ugly but this one is real pleasing:

2016 wins - 1
2017 wins - 5
2018 wins - 10

I'm really happy with those ten wins and I think everyone would agree that if we had a little more luck with injures, we could have had 15 wins easily this season.

Going with that trend, we should win around 14 to 18 games next season. I think that's enough to get into the eight.

It was disappointing to see the likes of Cogger, Deniss and Levi get a lot of game time because we had so many injuries but we have some great recruits coming so hopefully we see a lot less reserve grade players playing firsts in 2019.

Pearce was just amazing. Ponga and Pearce were a class above the rest of the squad and it was a pleasure watching them this season.

Furthermore, as the season progressed it was great to see Saifiti and Sione really improve. I'm super excited to see how they will continue their development next season. Ese'ese, Fitzgibbon and Guerra were godsends and hopefully they will be the three starting back rowers next season. Saulo looks like a big unit and I'm excited to see more of him as well.

Brown hasn't set the world alight but made that awesome mic dropping diss of Bennett which gets a thumbs up from me.

Overall, I'm super excited for next season, which ultimately means that this season was a positive overall for mine.

 

[Spot On]

9 wins Yoshy.

 

[NoSchitSherlock]

Disappointing but a major step forward.
We've sorted those guys that can consistently perform for us, those that are hot and cold and those that need the boot.
We definitely need some buys.
I reckon we have the basis of a team that can bite on the heels of a top 8 finish next year.
Consistent combinations will help us.

 

[Knight Vision]

Positives +
+ Ponga Ponga Ponga = future legend, havent been as excited to watch the footy in then long time. Thank You Kayln Ponga for your sublime poetry of football in motion. What an athlete.

+ Pearce, I used to despise this bloke, now he's wearing red and blue I love him. What a competitor ! We got us one of the best kicking games in the comp.

+ The continued improve of Fitz. DSaf, Sione

+ Guerra was epic ( tireless worker and we would have been much poorer this season without him- underestimated player )

+ Ese Ese was a recruitment master stroke. Comes across as a really polite young man as well. Does the club proud

Negatives -

- Defensive attitude, we lack mongrel. If we cant beat em at least send them home bruised and busted FFS. More than letting the tries in it's the lack of aggressive intent that concerns me more.

- Injuries- killed us. Half the spine missing for most of the season and didnt get to form combinations at any stage. Moga, Ross Jsaf, Griffin etc etc etc

- The above exposed a severe lack of depth

- Stagnation of Levi ( poor attitude ) and Barnett ( errors ) .Errors can be rectified so I hold hope for Barny he's a young fella and he will improve. Levi ? I worry more due to the position in the spine and attitude is born of character. Throwing ya toys out of the cot for not getting picked is a red flag. Needs to grow up first before he can fix his game. Young Danny grew u in an era where everyone got a medal at the sports carnival - sorry Danny boy this is grown up stuff now and only winners get medals mate.


Looking ahead

Just imagine how good Ponga could be

Recruitment of Ramien, Lee, Glasby

May the likes of King, Sio, Ross, Dennis not be sighted next year except in reserve grade. If they are anywhere near first grade for lengthy periods next year we will struggle to make the 8.

The young fellas have another season under the belt and cant wait to see Dsaf, Fitzy and Sione build on this year

Excited to see our spine stay on the field

Hope we get another dummy half. Levi is a concern and Slade has a mountain in front of him

Hope we get a recognized kicker

Hope we get a couple of angry bastards in the prop rotation.

 

[Woosh]

Last in metres conceded.
Last in run metres (gap from us to 15th is the same as the gap from 15th to 3rd!).

Ponga was fun to watch and Pearce is class.

All the new buys were amongst our best so Mooney gets a gold star.

Good point about Mooney getting a gold star.
We would’ve finished the same position on the ladder with no coach this season.
The additions of Ponga and Pearce helped us jagged a few more wins this year.
Lets face it Brown did no coaching this year or the previous two seasons but maybe one day he’ll have a team 1-17 of players from good systems.
That way he doesn’t need to coach.

 

[ryan.a87]

Good point about Mooney getting a gold star.
We would’ve finished the same position on the ladder with no coach this season.
The additions of Ponga and Pearce helped us jagged a few more wins this year.
Lets face it Brown did no coaching this year or the previous two seasons but maybe one day he’ll have a team 1-17 of players from good systems.
That way he doesn’t need to coach.

surely we are past thte point were a moderator can ban this troll

 

[TooheysNew]

surely we are past thte point were a moderator can ban this troll

For what exactly?

 

[Dave_]

It was shit. Apart from Ponga, I hated this season. Brown's persistence with Cogger and King was infuriating and more piss weak defence. We weren't exciting to watch and we played as dumb as ever in the opposition 20. Watching fair dinkum talentless players plodding out for us every week made me lose my shit and again, because we're so bad, the refs hammered us as per usual.

Injuries hurt us but that's part and parcel of any Knights season. 3rd worst attack and easily the worst defence don't equal a pass mark for mine.

 

[slotmachine]

the refs hammered us as per usual.

After 23 games we were;

3rd in penalty count win percentage (61%)
5th least penalised team
8th best penalty differential

 

[Dave_]

After 23 games we were;

3rd in penalty count win percentage (61%)
5th least penalised team
8th best penalty differential

The calls though. It seems like we don't get the 50/50 ones often if at all. Look at the Donkeys, they don't really get that many penalties but the ones they get are leg ups and game changers.

 

[Burns]

Give Nathan Brown up until first Origin game to decide whether or not he stays next year.

 

[Yosh]

Really great to see us pop up a couple of times on the tries of the season highlights. Pity it was always when we were getting scored on..

 

[Mr_Knightside]

I know that a lot of people were disappointed in 2018 but given what we’ve been through over the last few years if someone had offered me 9 wins and 11th spot on the ladder before the season kicked off I probably would have taken it. We probably over achieved a bit considering how little footy our spine actually played together as well.

We looked pretty good until Pearce went down and then we were shit for the rest of the season after that. A couple of wins towards the end of the year made it a bit more respectable.

The defence is still a big concern and we still leak points way too easily but at least we have the players on the park to win us games in those clutch moments. Pearce and Ponga were amazing and without them we were probably looking at another spoon year.

It’s been discussed a lot on here but I think it all comes back to the forward pack. Our defence is shit because we’re always on the wrong end of the yardage game and usually the possession game as well and because we concede so many metres in yardage teams are often finishing their sets in a good attacking position so we’re almost always under pressure. Also because we have to commit so much to the middle third of the field then our backs have to come in and often are caught in a 3-2 situation so they have to rush up to try and shut it down.

Brown knows this hence he’s looking to recruit some big middle forwards. I still think he’s probably 12 months away from having a team he’s really happy with. That being said our team next year is better and if we have a little more luck with injuries to key players I think we’ll be right in the mix for a top 8 spot.

 

[Swarzey]

Not sure what to make of it.

Injuries to our spine devastated us. We lacked considerable leadership without Pearce and yet when he returned, lost Ponga and Watson, stripping us of our spark. There was a brief period before Origin 1 against Penrith, Souths, Roosters and Melbourne where we were highly competitive for 60 minutes and every chance to win. Those games were against the best teams and in each of them we were almost perfect - our handling, our discipline, our defence were fantastic - we just lacked the leadership and the execution of Pearcey to win. For as bad as the last 2 months of the season were, it's incredibly poor to overlook that month even if in the end those scores didn't reflect the effort of the team.

To add to injuries, we saw the issue with our depth. As frustrating as it was to see Cogger and King remain in first grade, we simply didn't have anyone else. I can't fault Brown for picking them because nobody in reserve grade was putting their hand up and its been pretty f**king evident over the last few seasons that throwing Jersey Flegg players in before they're ready isn't going to help. Lose a single starting player and we were stuck with duds that we had carried last year. The impact of the last few years doesn't just hit the first grade squad, it trickles down to all grades and that was clearer than ever. Fortunately we have ridden ourselves of Cogger and Lamb, Remien coming in means if there is any injuries to the centres, Sione is more than capable of replacing them and Ross and Sio back in Reserve grade is enough depth in our backs. We're getting there in that regard but certainly having to rely on poor depth players was costly this year.

Our pack is our biggest issue. It's draining, absolutely draining when you don't have the pack to match other teams; when you can't get out of your own half, when you're constantly having to run an extra 30-40m per set because you don't have the size in the middle to stop teams. A poor pack results in poor defence imo; I believe if we can beef up our pack, then our defensive issues will improve.

I don't think this year was as bad as people are making it out to be. When we were poor, we were pretty poor, but it's a shit go to ignore the good that was pretty evident and not just good because we had Pearce and Ponga. I get it, negative emotion outweighs positive and bad memories stick more than good - whole science thing behind that - but those games I mentioned, the games we beat Penrith and Brisbane notably were performances good enough to stand above the bad.

It wasn't a great year overall but I don't think it was bad. It just was.

 

[Knight Vision]

Highlight of 2018 thus far is watching the Dragons smash the Broncos in the first half . Korbin having a shocka . I'm sure the face on Bennett right now is pure f**king gold.

 

[Spot On]

Yep our ex Knights continued their ripper form this weekend.

Korbin was horrific. Amazing how that happened today.... cost them dearly. He just doesn't have the smarts that bloke. Wants to play a role that does not suit him - self appointed toughman. It's a role that has never worked for him.

Time to take a different tact Korbin and play to your strengths.

 

[Old dog]

Yep our ex Knights continued their ripper form this weekend.

Korbin was horrific. Amazing how that happened today.... cost them dearly. He just doesn't have the smarts that bloke. Wants to play a role that does not suit him - self appointed toughman. It's a role that has never worked for him.

Time to take a different tact Korbin and play to your strengths.

Which is?