@Eddie said:
If your referencing the Cowboys 8-0 game do you know how silly that is??
That was a QLD cup style Cowboys team that threw nothing at us. We didn't defend that well at all really. If it was the Cowboys with Thurston, Morgan, Scott and Tamou maybe you would have a point.
The defence was no better that day. It was no better against Nawcastle who bombed 3-4 tries out wide against us. They are an awful side and if we had thrown some attack at them we would have been a good chance of putting some points on them.
The defence was no better against Manly or no better against Penrith, the Titans or no better against The Raiders. All teams miles outside the top 8\. We let in some really really soft tries in all those games. Today the quality of the opponents was much better hence we let in 42 instead of say 32 .Brisbane is the best team we have played in 3 months, simple as that, if you cant see that i would be surprised.
Unleashing the attack was simply giving Moses and Brooks some more freedom to play a bit of what they see. I think its a long bow to draw to say that was responsible for letting in 42 today. Rather it was a continuation of poor defence through out the season. Not better, not worse, just happened to be we played a team going 1st with a full strength line up away from home.
I think your really clutching at straws with this thread, in another desperate attempt to defend earlier performances against really poor sides (cows, knights, titans, penrith)
However it is an entirely predictable thread.
I never said the attack was responsible for letting in 42 yesterday. And I don't think it is silly to compare this game to the Cowboys match. In fact I think it is a perfect comparison: contrasting and analysing two totally different types of losses.
Personally, I'd always rather an 8-0 loss than 42-16\. I don't care who you are playing, there is no way 42 points conceded can be more positive than 8 points conceded.
42 points means it wasn't even close, the opposition could score at will, a point every 2 minutes. At least in the Cowboys game, as dour and ordinary as it was, we were in it until the 80th minute. Let other sides play the exciting games for TV, I want to win!
The point I am making is I've read a fair amount of "positives" taken from yesterday's game, people comforted that we troubled Broncos for 20 minutes. People comforted to see the young kids play with a bit more room and enterprise. Perhaps some people comforted that the loss wasn't by as big a margin as they expected; that we accounted for ourselves ok considering Broncos are first and we are last.
Bollocks. Everyone expected us to lose, we lost handsomely and it is extremely disappointing to be in that situation. That is the old Tigers: teams that were beaten before they even took the field.
It's almost like people are less upset than previous weeks, perhaps because they've well and truly given up on the season now, but more upset by our close losses than the flogging we endured yesterday.
People savaged JT because he tried to temper the attack whilst getting the defence right, supporters crying out over how boring a team we had become. Supporters leaping all over him for the "spin" he was producing: that until we get the defence right, no manner of attack is going to help us.
I saw yesterday's game as the old Tigers, absolutely no step in the right direction, chancing our hand and paper-thin defence. I saw exactly the kind of performance that achieves 3 finals in 15 years. And somehow some people prefer this to a dour 8-0 loss.
