LIVE GAME Round 27 vs. Eels

Live Game Discussion
innsaneink said:
Every time we sack a coach it takes a season or two before the incoming coach gets the team he wants.
If we sack coaches because we are 1wun 6 losses after round seven, or 3/9 after round 12...no coach worth his salt will come here with that type of job insecurity hanging over him, all we'll get is novice inexperienced rookies just like Marshall.
He mentioned at the presser he's not coaching to keep his job, he's coaching to make the team and players better... After being asked about a quick fix... He's not too worried about winning now as he's looking at the big picture which is success for an extended period... That's all well and good but success starved members and fans might disagree.
In the same presser he admitted there was no game plan for the Parra game "my fault"... And told players to just play footy.
Was this because it was the last game of the year?
Did he have no ideas on how to try and compete against Parra?
When does making the players and team better begin... Because that's his long term vision but it appears he didn't include round 27 spoon bowl 2024 in that vision.
Maybe he should've advised the 18k or whatever the crowd figure was in the week leading up to spoonbowl that there's no game plan which in professional NRL will equate to conceding 60 odd points.
Does it start next year?
Did it start sometime this year?
If so... Why the week off?
Giving your players no instructions.. No game plans, none of your experience of 17 years or whatever it is of NRL & international footy.
In my opinion he gave up before we even stepped into the ring.

Thanks for that coach!

Yes.... season '24 was gone by round 7.or 8 but we had a little something to cheer and hope for 23 weeks later, something that could've given us all a small smile for even just a minute after a year of tears anger and frustration... But coach decided to have the final week off.

Thanks coach 👍
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Great summary ink
Benji as a coach reminds me of Mal Meninga as a politician, but Mal hadrhe good grace to quit
 
Tucker said:
Exactly right Ink. They promoted the hell out of this game and to not even try was very disappointing. Gutho said winning that game meant everything to Parra.
The other question is….what did they do at training for the two weeks they had to prepare for that game? Parra could only dedicate 6 days to it and scored 11 tries.
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It was a bitter disappointment to finish the season like that. Smashed into next season.

I’m just trying to figure out what we learned from it.

Whatever the 2 week program was, I think it was deeply flawed. Then the selections were flawed, game plan flawed, motivation flawed…. Just about everything was wrong in the most important game of the season.

And for balance, a lot of the players let Benji down as coach and i think personally. So they are not off the hook by any stretch.

And Api…wtf was racing through his mind?!

All the honesty sessions with the senior players, they’ve spent most of the season in the confessional. Maybe he shouldn’t have said anything to them.

Massive pre season challenges for him to get them to do his bidding.

He doesn’t instruct them to be lazy and stupid.

My gut feeling is he’s tried everything by now.

A couple of things he may not have done is been a lot tougher earlier on. Drop the big names, hook them for stupidity or incompetence in real time.

He’s tried loyalty as a motivation and I agree with the positivity of it, but they are forcing him to be brutal.

And we won’t discuss injuries and unavailability. Every team has to cope with that.

Its such a bad finish, flogged to death at home in a sell out. The world to play for and very few of the lads showed up.
 
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tiger_one said:
The Tigers become the 7th time in history to finish last 3 years in a row
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if we aren’t aggressive in the market place, we might have to peruse the 4th spoon award holders. Get in early.

Not that the kids are bad in and of themselves, they just aren’t ready.

Then the ones that power on next season, we have to hope they continue to commit. We might be fending off some big clubs, greedy managers and all that. Nature of the beast.
 
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GNR4LIFE said:
I’d take 9th over 17th every day of the week. Why would you rather see your team win 6 games a year, instead of 12?
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I'd rather finish last with local talent coming through as we gave, than make Moses Mbye a millionaire for finishing ninth, yea. Id rather last than Madge making everyone miserable from overtraining, making the club even less attractive to join, while hitching the clubs fortunes to an Oportos addicted BJ Leilua. I prefer this because I know for a fact if you stick to principles for long enough and not take shortcuts, you end up winning 16 or 17 games a season, and probably a premiership too.
 
TIGERS said:
I'd rather finish last with local talent coming through as we gave, than make Moses Mbye a millionaire for finishing ninth, yea. Id rather last than Madge making everyone miserable from overtraining, making the club even less attractive to join, while hitching the clubs fortunes to an Oportos addicted BJ Leilua. I prefer this because I know for a fact if you stick to principles for long enough and not take shortcuts, you end up winning 16 or 17 games a season, and probably a premiership too.
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How long are planning for to achieve these goals? Will not happen until we get a coach that can develop the young talent we have and mould a team with the journeymen we have.
 
Droppy05 said:
How long are planning for to achieve these goals? Will not happen until we get a coach that can develop the young talent we have and mould a team with the journeymen we have.
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12 months. Next season will be great.

Benji has graded more teenages this year than likely any coach has done in an NRL season ever. We won 35% of matches with Sezer and 0 without. We will pick up a lot more points next season.
 
851 said:
Him and Pole are our 2 worst defensive forwards, we can't carry players who are a lazy arm grabbers, costs us tries every week, one is gone, maybe both, me I won't be too disappointed if both go
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Where's our defence coach !!!!!!
 
What was really learnt out of that game or should have been if people were less emotional and more analytical

The team with 1600 FG games experience beat the team with 1100 games experience

The backline with almost 700 games experience beat the one where 5 of the 7 had not played NRL before this year

The team who had their Captain and best player sinbinned - during which time they let in 3 tries lost

The team who after that sin bin replaced their hooker with a prop, their halfback with a prop and their centre with a prop with 15 minutes to go because they had no other option let in 3 tries when that had happened

None of those things are surprising because that could happen to any team in that situation - you lose 2 members of your spine and a centre with no backs on the bench then you will let in tries. In fact a clear factor in our season (and most teams season even the Storm whose losses mainly came with a backline injury as well) is when you lose 1 outside back to injury during the match you struggle but some teams carry a back but once you lose 2 backs you are done.

We lost 5 or 6 games this year when we were in the contest and lost an outside back mid game - Toa x 3, Tupou, Olam, Naden, Casey - also taking into account often these players tried to play on injured for a while before they left the field.

What we should have learnt is that experience matters in the NRL and players on the field matters in the NRL and that isn't effort or defensive structure or even talent
 
boonboon said:
What was really learnt out of that game or should have been if people were less emotional and more analytical

The team with 1600 FG games experience beat the team with 1100 games experience

The backline with almost 700 games experience beat the one where 5 of the 7 had not played NRL before this year

The team who had their Captain and best player sinbinned - during which time they let in 3 tries lost

The team who after that sin bin replaced their hooker with a prop, their halfback with a prop and their centre with a prop with 15 minutes to go because they had no other option let in 3 tries when that had happened

None of those things are surprising because that could happen to any team in that situation - you lose 2 members of your spine and a centre with no backs on the bench then you will let in tries. In fact a clear factor in our season (and most teams season even the Storm whose losses mainly came with a backline injury as well) is when you lose 1 outside back to injury during the match you struggle but some teams carry a back but once you lose 2 backs you are done.

We lost 5 or 6 games this year when we were in the contest and lost an outside back mid game - Toa x 3, Tupou, Olam, Naden, Casey - also taking into account often these players tried to play on injured for a while before they left the field.

What we should have learnt is that experience matters in the NRL and players on the field matters in the NRL and that isn't effort or defensive structure or even talent
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Well said Boonboon
 
boonboon said:
What was really learnt out of that game or should have been if people were less emotional and more analytical

The team with 1600 FG games experience beat the team with 1100 games experience

The backline with almost 700 games experience beat the one where 5 of the 7 had not played NRL before this year

The team who had their Captain and best player sinbinned - during which time they let in 3 tries lost

The team who after that sin bin replaced their hooker with a prop, their halfback with a prop and their centre with a prop with 15 minutes to go because they had no other option let in 3 tries when that had happened

None of those things are surprising because that could happen to any team in that situation - you lose 2 members of your spine and a centre with no backs on the bench then you will let in tries. In fact a clear factor in our season (and most teams season even the Storm whose losses mainly came with a backline injury as well) is when you lose 1 outside back to injury during the match you struggle but some teams carry a back but once you lose 2 backs you are done.

We lost 5 or 6 games this year when we were in the contest and lost an outside back mid game - Toa x 3, Tupou, Olam, Naden, Casey - also taking into account often these players tried to play on injured for a while before they left the field.

What we should have learnt is that experience matters in the NRL and players on the field matters in the NRL and that isn't effort or defensive structure or even talent
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Yep, the successful formula in the NRL is to have a cohesive group of experienced players who have played together for consecutive years, combined with an emerging group of young players who are gradually brought into the fold. What we tried to do this year was forced on us by the past administration and was akin to smashing oil and water together. Some senior players became disgruntled and wanted out. They’re not for the crocodile roll. It’ll take time to fix, but this year should have been the low point.
 
boonboon said:
What was really learnt out of that game or should have been if people were less emotional and more analytical

The team with 1600 FG games experience beat the team with 1100 games experience

The backline with almost 700 games experience beat the one where 5 of the 7 had not played NRL before this year

The team who had their Captain and best player sinbinned - during which time they let in 3 tries lost

The team who after that sin bin replaced their hooker with a prop, their halfback with a prop and their centre with a prop with 15 minutes to go because they had no other option let in 3 tries when that had happened

None of those things are surprising because that could happen to any team in that situation - you lose 2 members of your spine and a centre with no backs on the bench then you will let in tries. In fact a clear factor in our season (and most teams season even the Storm whose losses mainly came with a backline injury as well) is when you lose 1 outside back to injury during the match you struggle but some teams carry a back but once you lose 2 backs you are done.

We lost 5 or 6 games this year when we were in the contest and lost an outside back mid game - Toa x 3, Tupou, Olam, Naden, Casey - also taking into account often these players tried to play on injured for a while before they left the field.

What we should have learnt is that experience matters in the NRL and players on the field matters in the NRL and that isn't effort or defensive structure or even talent
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Manly 2 weeks earlier had almost 2100 games experience (2096) and we beat them fairly well...I know thats not the only point to your post, just saying....
 
We might have scored them if they weren't binned... We'll never know
How that's relevant to 1st grade experience im not sure
 
boonboon said:
What we should have learnt is that experience matters in the NRL and players on the field matters in the NRL and that isn't effort or defensive structure or even talent
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Well we didn’t learn that because we played an 18 year old in the halves for 21/24 games. The only ones he missed were when he was suspended or spitting his dummy about moving clubs.
 
crazycat said:
Answer:
Shane Flanagan. Could have gotten us within the top 8.

Why?

Look at St George roster compared to ours. Honestly, on paper the Dragons are a far worse a team then us.
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What paper you looking at?
(Orange and Black one)?

Dragons have 2 origin definites and a 3rd that was unlucky….
We’re here hoping Stefano makes origin even though he didn’t earn it…

That said - Api should feel hard done by.
 
colinbh said:
Well said. Our team will be so much better next year.

Bula
Stains/Montoya
Olam
Taruva/Bird
Skelton
Galvin/Latau
Luei/Latau/Galvin
Bird/Bigred
Latau brothers/Pole
Api/TDS
Hunt
Bigred/Pole
We have some promising young forwards coming through but our backs are still to young. Magaseni? and Large come to mind.
I'm sure that people on this forum who are familiar with our lower grades can add to the list.

Good times ahead.
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Still get the spoon next year
 
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