No, hell has not frozen over, nor has the earth stopped spinning. Parramatta have won their fourth game of the season. The Eels won 26-22 over fellow cellar dweller, the Wests Tigers.
The Tigers scored first through rookie David Nofoaluma but Sio was quick to respond for the Eels. Then Mullaney crossed to push the Eels lead further ahead. However, the Tigers weren't going to lie down as Marika Korobeite responded with a try of his own.
Vai Toutai then crossed on the stroke of half time to give the Eels a 14-10 lead at half time. Mullaney was one of the Eels' best in the first half, looking very solid under the high ball.
Hayne was wreaking havoc all across the park with Roberts doing his thing out-wide. Fuifui was also looking threatening, playing outside Luke Kelly.
The second half didn't start the way the Eels wanted with Korobeite grabbing his second in the first 15 minutes. Junior Paulo then showed how strong he was when he carried three Tigers defenders over the line and slammed the ball down.
Parramatta led 20-16 but some poor execution let the Tigers back in the match with Simona diving over in the corner. With Benji Marshall's conversion, the Tigers led 22-20 with 9 minutes remaining.
The Eels then began to pile on the pressure. Ben Roberts sliced open the Tigers and was followed up with Hayne making plenty of metres.
Hayne then looped around the back of Luke Kelly to take a pass. He shuffled the ball wide to Reni Maitua who quickly got it to Ben Roberts. Roberts stepped off his left foot, straightened and drew three defenders before stepping off his right and sending Vai Toutai over for his second.
A sideline conversion from Joseph Paulo sealed a 26-22 win for the Eels.
Plenty of positives came out of the match for Parramatta. Although Hayne was named at five-eighth he popped up all across the field and caused damage with his running and passing game.
Jake Mullaney had one of his best games at fullback, winning the man of the match award. Although Roberts was a little full of rocks in the first half, his second half performance would've been heartening for Eels fans with plenty of damaging runs and very little errors.
Peni Terepo as always ran straight and hard with Tim Mannah also making plenty of metres and really causing problems for the Tigers' defence.
Replies
The boys did it for Willie ... ;]P
Hayne: "I liked having Roberts in the centres. I hope it's the same next week."
Good to have a win anyway woooooohooooooo
Still, who cares? We won!
Sio is not a good defender, at least two tries were scored in his wing, he is out of place most of the time, lost somewhere in the centres, or when he is in his wing he wont put his body in the line. He lets more tries in that what he scores. So is a liability.
Absolutely loved Ricky's ploy of constantly swapping players positions.
Stuffed the Tige's gameplan big time because our weaker players were NOT staying in the one spot to be targeted.
However - although it was a great defensive move by the coach it really does show how weak we are.
Now the good point - It was a far better game to watch than the Bunnies.
Lead changed 8 times during the game and the Eels were actually showing some good attack.
Just put Sio into prop and let him defend in the middle of the paddock to his hearts content.
At NO time during the whole game did he mark up on his opposite number - their winger was facing open paddock all night - just shows how inept the Tige's are by not coming at Sio for the entire game.
Is anyone else experiencing the same problem as me?
the NRL ipad app doesn't seem to have the 2nd half of the game from Friday night...but all other matches have both halves :\
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