….let's have a look at our weaknesses and how we can improve them. (aside from saying we lack heart, we're s**t and SACK POTTER).
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For me, there were TWO fundamental areas that the tigers failed to execute at even the most basic level in the 2nd half.
1) **Last play options**: I'm not sure how much has been spoken about this tonight, but they were absolutely abysmal after our 3rd try. No direction, no cohesion and poor kicks from both brooks and Anasta. I remember one of brook's ones curved back around behind koroibete and he had to scramble around to try and clean it up as best he could. Another was playing hot potato with it until Lulia ran 5m down the edge and kicked it to their fullback.
There were too many bombs. With the catching in the in goal rule, combined with a 7 tackle set if it goes dead, bombs are NOT the future of this game. Grubbers and hard hitting centres/2nd rowers supplemented by wingers creating overlaps appears to be the way forward. I barely saw a single grubber in that final hour, and i have no clue why. Brooks is great at it and it's so much more likely to result in some kind of error or misjudgement by a dragon. A bounce of the ball and we score. Instead, we chose to kick it up in the air, inviting them to simply catch it and bring it to the 20\. (is this a 7 tackle set btw cause it should be).
2) **Discipline** - Im sure a lot of you were expecting me to say defence here. But apart from probably 4 players in the entire team letting people down (brooks, lulia, gavet and bodene) and 1 or 2 lapses here or there I thought our defence STRUCTURE was improved from last season for most of the game. Got a little lazy around the ruck as we faced set after set from the drags. But there were periods where i was quite impressed with our goal line D, holding em out for ~12 tackles BUT our lack of discipline resulted in a try on the 14th or 15th.
If you showed someone the penalty count (12-6 i think), most would instantly guess a 2 or 3 try victory to the team with 12\. And they'd be correct, 3 more tries to the dragons. You simply cannot afford to give any team, even the NSW Cup wooden spooners, set after set after set from 30 out. you will concede points, and then you will blame the defence. We put up around 320 tackes in that game, 60 more than the dragons. You wont win many games with those stats, especially not in the heat as you fatigue far quicker and it really is a game of attrition there.
There were some other corrolary factors coming into the game. We didn't cope well with the heat (hell, neither did I. Drank about 1.2 L of water in an hour and ran out so bought an overpriced maxibon from those thieves at ANZ), and made errors and a few basic missed tackles as a result. The removal of richards, farah and lawrence definitely didn't help our cohesion or help kind of relax players going into the game. A little bit chaotic i guess, people in and out. Not quite sure how to explain it.
Anyway, those factors stood out to me. Maybe some other stuff seemed more important to you.
Many will fix themselves up. But the players just need to take a deep breath, and make next week a fresh start. Focus on improving communication and giving more options on the last play. Not just a bomb in the air. Also, go over discpline repeatedly through out the week. I was disappointed by our inability to adapt to the rule changes. I was hoping potter would try to instill that the speed was far greater and ways to avoid getting penalised. But i guess it's very hard to do in a week when you've trained all offseason to do the opposite.
If you've read this whole thing, congratz!
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For me, there were TWO fundamental areas that the tigers failed to execute at even the most basic level in the 2nd half.
1) **Last play options**: I'm not sure how much has been spoken about this tonight, but they were absolutely abysmal after our 3rd try. No direction, no cohesion and poor kicks from both brooks and Anasta. I remember one of brook's ones curved back around behind koroibete and he had to scramble around to try and clean it up as best he could. Another was playing hot potato with it until Lulia ran 5m down the edge and kicked it to their fullback.
There were too many bombs. With the catching in the in goal rule, combined with a 7 tackle set if it goes dead, bombs are NOT the future of this game. Grubbers and hard hitting centres/2nd rowers supplemented by wingers creating overlaps appears to be the way forward. I barely saw a single grubber in that final hour, and i have no clue why. Brooks is great at it and it's so much more likely to result in some kind of error or misjudgement by a dragon. A bounce of the ball and we score. Instead, we chose to kick it up in the air, inviting them to simply catch it and bring it to the 20\. (is this a 7 tackle set btw cause it should be).
2) **Discipline** - Im sure a lot of you were expecting me to say defence here. But apart from probably 4 players in the entire team letting people down (brooks, lulia, gavet and bodene) and 1 or 2 lapses here or there I thought our defence STRUCTURE was improved from last season for most of the game. Got a little lazy around the ruck as we faced set after set from the drags. But there were periods where i was quite impressed with our goal line D, holding em out for ~12 tackles BUT our lack of discipline resulted in a try on the 14th or 15th.
If you showed someone the penalty count (12-6 i think), most would instantly guess a 2 or 3 try victory to the team with 12\. And they'd be correct, 3 more tries to the dragons. You simply cannot afford to give any team, even the NSW Cup wooden spooners, set after set after set from 30 out. you will concede points, and then you will blame the defence. We put up around 320 tackes in that game, 60 more than the dragons. You wont win many games with those stats, especially not in the heat as you fatigue far quicker and it really is a game of attrition there.
There were some other corrolary factors coming into the game. We didn't cope well with the heat (hell, neither did I. Drank about 1.2 L of water in an hour and ran out so bought an overpriced maxibon from those thieves at ANZ), and made errors and a few basic missed tackles as a result. The removal of richards, farah and lawrence definitely didn't help our cohesion or help kind of relax players going into the game. A little bit chaotic i guess, people in and out. Not quite sure how to explain it.
Anyway, those factors stood out to me. Maybe some other stuff seemed more important to you.
Many will fix themselves up. But the players just need to take a deep breath, and make next week a fresh start. Focus on improving communication and giving more options on the last play. Not just a bomb in the air. Also, go over discpline repeatedly through out the week. I was disappointed by our inability to adapt to the rule changes. I was hoping potter would try to instill that the speed was far greater and ways to avoid getting penalised. But i guess it's very hard to do in a week when you've trained all offseason to do the opposite.
If you've read this whole thing, congratz!
