@balmain-boy said in Jersey Flegg Team List: Round 1 2020:
I thought our entire spine was poor. Fullback was invisible, halves were poor, hooker poor. Not good enough.
The rotation of our forwards was baffling. Lui who was our best forward played the first 20 and then didn’t come back on until there was 4 mins to go! Smith did raise the tempo but he’s just so small, his technique is good and he hits hard but he’s smaller than Kyle Lovett. Hard to see him making it in the NRL but he could be the exception to the rule.
The entire team played as if they thought they could just show up and they’d win. We were playing at walking pace, occasionally breaking into a jog. Dragons were doing everything at 100% intensity. That was the difference. And their number 4 was a standout with his size and pace. Sadly our centres were a long long way behind him.
We had a galeforce wind and yet Stefanovic persisted with grubbers he kept overhitting. We forced a couple of dropouts, one of which the dragons got back because our boys were mind blowingly standing on halfway, despite the previous dropout barely making 30m. This one again went 30m and there was no-one within 15m of the ball when it bounced, and a bad bounce so it go back to the 20m line and into dragons arms.They were simply not switched on and the coach was silent on the bench.
There was no talk on the field whatsoever. Our attack was non existent. Scoots from dummy half and one off the ruck hitups. The halves never made any space for the backs, and the backs rarely saw any ball, if they did it was just side to side rubbish. Neither Cini nor Hoffman looked capable of beating their man one on one. Rizk was heavily involved and busted his ass all day. Scoalri tried hard too but got belted hitting the ball up due to his upright stance.
We repeatedly lost the ruck. They landed on the front every tackle and got quick play the balls. We got turned onto our backs every hit up and got sluggish play the balls.
I think the lack of cohesion an come down to so much turnover in the trials. But the poor attitude was just complacency.
Stefanovic missed a kick from next to the posts which cost us big time. A try to Hoffman on the bell gave him a kick after the siren to get a draw but it faded into the wind. We didn’t deserve a point.
Don’t know where Dillon was, but McKenzie was rubbish. Small, and never involved in support or backline moves.
If the attitude picks up i think their confidence will grow from there. A lot of quality in the squad, it just sadly wasn’t on show yesterday. Quality that wasn’t in the squad to so there’s always the possibility of fresh faces
We should have won despite not playing well. Two incidents which cost us the game -
Hoffman dropped a pass off Field when all he had to do was catch and fall over the line.
Cini was caught infield, failed to get back into position and the Dragons took advantage of the numbers and scored.
Our starting props made metres but were slow and lacked agility. Smith was easily our best forward and to me looks Nathan Brown size. He is deceptive because of his build but hits hard and makes metres.
Stefanovic was our best, looking dangerous with the ball, getting repeat sets, scoring a great try and working overtime with Scolari to cover Cini.
Both wingers demonstrated good pace, strength and were unlucky not to score. Our centres failed to set them up and this is something the coach must work on. Rizk was put over the side line after making a great burst while Scolari was called back when he would have gone the length of the field.
Cini would not displace either winger and must play centre or not at all. He needs to work hard on his defence and hiding him on the wing just shifts the problem and displaces a better player. Scolari was yelling throughout the game to number off and cover.
