Today had a good chat with a current NRL referee who has been in the top grade for a few seasons now. He knows I am a mad eels supporter. I asked him how he thought we would go this year. In a nutshell he gave me the following feedback :
- He has done a number of sessions at the Club this pre-season already and last year. He felt we were the least impressive outfit in most training categories. He felt we didnt commit to the 1% stuff most of the time and that in opposed sessions players refused to get on side and there were errors around the ruck and play the ball every set. Little or no discipline and respect for the ruck.
- He felt some of our players, were not fit and that they lacked the committment to lift a cog. Did mention Pauli as a major weakness in the line due to his movement and inabiliy to maintain line speed.
- He said the Roosters, Storm and Souths were miles ahead in terms of fitness and structure at training and how they minimised those errors. He believed that they were very much a Culture of not accepting errors, failure and short changing. They trained hard at doing the 1% and getting them right 100% of the time.
- Once again stated unless we changed our attitude and culture 2016 would be the same result. He stated Refs didnt pick on Parramatta but he stated that when the going got tough in games, the discipline went out the window and they reverted to cheap and lazy options. He felt we could compete with most teams but when we tried to move into the contain and control phase of a game we let ourselves down badly. Agreed FORAN will relieve the pressure with a short kicking game.
Nothing too earth shattering but having watched plenty of training sessions, I would tend to agree that the attitutde is very much laid back and I remain unconvinced that our two assistants MURPHY & GENTLE are a huge help to ARTHURS.
Hope my friend and I are wrong on all counts.
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As a result Parra has set up its own cloning facility, and the team is currently being coached by 11 BAs. Fong is over the moon at this news! (Apparently next on the list is cloning our greatest ever fullback, Scott Mahon, in his prime, followed by Michael Ericson - baldness and all!! Exciting times!!!)
So as you can see - PT was correct when he was talking about the Arthurs and their experience coaching the team this year....
On that, hoppa offered himself up for cloning as part of his settlement with the Eels, but Eels management politely declined.
I find it hard to believe....
Have to agree that article seems a little sus. Roosters are the most heavily penalised team in the NRL so cannot see how they do the 1% that well.
That being said some parts such as us not competing for 80 mins is usually associated with lack of fitness. Also not being able to lift with opposing teams is also fitness related. If not physically fit your mental application also suffers late in the match when under the pump. Oh well, more sand hills much to the annoyance of EE, FF and Grunta.
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