Brandon Wakeham #267

jrtiger

jrtiger

Well-known member
The Wests Tigers have increased their halves depth for the upcoming NRL season by signing Canterbury utility Brandon Wakeham.
Wakeham signed a one-year deal with the Tigers on Monday as a back-up for first-choice halves Luke Brooks and Adam Doueihi.

Veteran coach Tim Sheens signed the 24-year-old after being impressed with his performances last year, after he started the season in first grade before leading the NSW Cup side to the grand final.

He’s an important signing for the Tigers, given they’ve lost Jackson Hastings to Newcastle and Jock Madden to Brisbane.

MORE TO COME



Edit 19th March: Thanks for starting Wakeham thread @watersider as it appears this (above) is the only mention of his signing on the forum. Therefore I've made some amendments by including the initial announcement post by @jrtiger
 
I could not have been less enthused when he signed but in a terrible start to the season he's actually been really good. And I'm just thinking that he might actually be a good halfback.

Played great halfback role in trial v Canberra (very average against warriors), was pretty clinical in the brief snippets I saw of him in NSW cup and then was the biggest factor in changing the game and giving us some attack against the dogs. It was total transformation.

He's a sharp runner, quality passer (hey, a half who can pass!), decent kicker and has good instincts and support play and even tackled kikau on our line, something that doueihi couldn't manage. He showed more in his brief spell today than we've seen from a half at our club for a long time.

Is it possible our club has fluked a decent halfback? Any reason not to be positive about him?
 
watersider said:
I could not have been less enthused when he signed but in a terrible start to the season he's actually been really good. And I'm just thinking that he might actually be a good halfback.

Played great halfback role in trial v Canberra (very average against warriors), was pretty clinical in the brief snippets I saw of him in NSW cup and then was the biggest factor in changing the game and giving us some attack against the dogs. It was total transformation.

He's a sharp runner, quality passer (hey, a half who can pass!), decent kicker and has good instincts and support play and even tackled kikau on our line, something that doueihi couldn't manage. He showed more in his brief spell today than we've seen from a half at our club for a long time.

Is it possible our club has fluked a decent halfback? Any reason not to be positive about him?
Click to expand...
And yet all he really did was play a good first grade halfback game. I think we have been numbed by LB and co for so long that we’d actually forgotten what even a half decent 7 can add to the team. Draw and pass ,put someone through a gap, back up, it’s all so simple when you think about it.
 
With the way Wakeham played today he deserves a 10 year contract and the superpower to never be dropped even if he plays the next 10 years as a park footballer at best, bringing zero value to the team. I mean after all weve done it before for a bloke after 1 good game on debut.
 
The first trial he was average but in saying that we weren’t full strength. The second trial he was good and the last 2 Cup games has had a huge role in us winning those games and almost made a comeback for us. I think he’s got the potential to play 7 going forward for us.
 
Wakeham has always had talent...plus a great kicking game...plus is an excellent goalkicker...plus he can assist on multiple tries per game...

The issues? He has always tried to be Benji Marshall / extrovert. Go back to his dyed blonde hair days at the Dogs and flick passes into the crowd.

'That' Wakeham we do not need.

But he has also had great games...I saw him absolutely slaughter our state cup team before and was light years better than our state cup halves.

He is genuinely creative and can organise.

He is exactly what we need as long as he can keep maturing and realise he needs to play under control and not like Benji Marshall.
 
ElleryHanley said:
Wakeham has always had talent...plus a great kicking game...plus is an excellent goalkicker...plus he can assist on multiple tries per game...

The issues? He has always tried to be Benji Marshall / extrovert. Go back to his dyed blonde hair days at the Dogs and flick passes into the crowd.

'That' Wakeham we do not need.

But he has also had great games...I saw him absolutely slaughter our state cup team before and was light years better than our state cup halves.

He is genuinely creative and can organise.

He is exactly what we need as long as he can keep maturing and realise he needs to play under control and not like Benji Marshall.
Click to expand...
Exciting to hear you positive about a player. Not saying you're overly negative, just hadn't been much to be positive about for about ten years.
 
watersider said:
Exciting to hear you positive about a player. Not saying you're overly negative, just hadn't been much to be positive about for about ten years.
Click to expand...
I am actually quite excited...Da Silva is the best young nine I have seen come through in ages.

Bateman and Klemmer are leaders.

Matamua will be a decade long player at 13.

We just need the Brooks / Nofa / Twal / loser mentality era to be completely cleaned out.
 
ElleryHanley said:
Wakeham has always had talent...plus a great kicking game...plus is an excellent goalkicker...plus he can assist on multiple tries per game...

The issues? He has always tried to be Benji Marshall / extrovert. Go back to his dyed blonde hair days at the Dogs and flick passes into the crowd.

'That' Wakeham we do not need.

But he has also had great games...I saw him absolutely slaughter our state cup team before and was light years better than our state cup halves.

He is genuinely creative and can organise.

He is exactly what we need as long as he can keep maturing and realise he needs to play under control and not like Benji Marshall.
Click to expand...
The trouble is the sheenius won't drop Brooks cause that's admitting he was wrong
 
Im not getting carried away with him.

His best value for now is that puts pressure on Luke and lets Luke know he needs to play better.

Funny how Brooks looked interested when he came on.
 
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