Eels Blogs

 Team Review: (7.5/10)

1. Clinton Gutherson (9.5)
   1. Good support play for the first try. Good tackle breaking run for the second try. Nice try assist to Sivo’s last try. Ran for plenty of meters
   2. Got caught wrong footed for Averilo’ try. Not much he could do against DWZ’s try.
2. Maika Sivo (8.5)
   1. Great powerful running for his first try. Good work on his second try. I think he is slowly hitting form again.
   2. Not much defense required.
3. Tom Opacic (8)
   1. Surprisingly breaks a lot of tackles.
   2. Good defensively again.
4. Marata Niukore (8)
   1. Great hole running for his try.
   2. Conceded one try down his edge. They were outnumbered, so not much they could have done. They charged out quickly which is the right thing to do. But Dogs iced it off.
5. Blake Ferguson (8)
   1. I read people criticizing Fergo’s performance. He was great. Ran plenty of hard yards. Didn’t break as many tackles.
   2. Conceded one try down his edge. They were outnumbered, so not much they could have done. They charged out quickly which is the right thing to do. But Dogs iced it off.
6. Dylan Brown (5)
   1. More on him later. But in attack, had a line break and dropped the ball in the tackle. Then got on the outside of his men another time and tried a miracle flick pass to Fergo and failed. Also dropped the ball once when playing the ball.
   2. Slid a bit too early for Averilo’s try. However, Mahoney should have done much better on his inside.
7. Mitchell Moses (8.5)
   1. Controlling the game from his kicking game as per usual.
   2. Defended well
8. Regan Campbell – Gillard (8)
   1. Ran for plenty of meters and defended well
9. Reed Mahoney (8.5)
   1. Nice run to step up Gutho. Kicked well
   2. No idea why he was defending as a backrower for Averilo’s try. Him and Brown both at fault. Mahoney has no lateral acceleration. Struggles defending out wide.
10. Junior Paulo (7)
    1. Had some strong carries but seemed a bit off tonight. Some unnecessary offloads and passes that put his teammates under pressure. Teams put a lot more focus on containing Paulo’s offloads this year
    2. Missed 4 tackles.
11. Shaun Lane (8)
    1. Received a hospital pass from Gutho. Don’t blame him for dropping the ball. Gave away a penalty. However, I liked Lane’s performance tonight. I think he provided plenty of go forward in the middle.
    2. Defended well. I believe this is he future role in the team, unless injuries occur.
12. Isaiah Papali’i (9)
    1. Some damaging runs and great in defense. He has to run at Walker all game next week. Nice try assist to Sivo.
13. Nathan Brown (5)
    1. Not much done in his time before getting injured. Had a couple good runs. Could notice the lack of line speed when he was out. Apparently, 4 weeks is worst case scenario which is not a bad outcome.
14. Oregon Kaufusi (7.5)
    1. Did well in attack and defense in his first time starting in the NRL. Will be doing it when Paulo plays origin.
15. Bryce Cartwright (8.5)
    1. Two great try assists for Carty tonight. May earn a starting spot next week with N Brown injured
    2. Defended well.
16. Ryan Matterson (7.5)
    1. Good return from injury. Did his job in attacking and defense.
17. Haze Dunster (3)
    1. Limited time on the wing. Interestingly, jams in every time instead of sliding.

Coach: Brad Arthur

Decided to give Gutho a break which make sense. Did he give us a glimpse to our future by playing Dunster on the wing and removing Fergo? I liked starting Kaufusi to give him the experience.

General Observations:

Sloppy Game

I am not concerned by how sloppy our game was at stages. We returned from very bad conditions at Darwin. When your opposition is playing at a low level, you can do the same thing, especially when the game is pretty much won. We stepped up against big teams, Storm and Raiders when it mattered. So, yea. We will be fine.

Dylan Brown

The big talking point. My opinion on this is probably only shared by HFK and a couple others. Firstly, D Brown is our future, and no doubt has great ability. We have no idea what BA tells Brown to do. For all we know, BA expects D Brown to run the ball and try a couple things. Whereas, Mahoney, Gutho and Moses are expected to pull most of the strings. Many people in the game day blog, who are now criticizing the fuck out of Brown actually predicted that he will be MOM. So, it makes no sense how people have faith that he is going to play well, but then criticize that he should be in reserve grade and is utterly useless in attack. Yes, Brown had a poor game today, but his last 2 games against Dragons (our MOM) and Broncos were his best games in a long time. He nearly put players away and also nearly broke the line a couple times. However, just because he had a hiccup today, it’s time to get our ‘hating’ attitude back on him.

I personally, thought he was given his debut too young. I thought he needed time in reserve grade before he went onto the NRL. The skills level of a Jersey Flegg halfback to a NRL five-eight is tremendous. He should have been given the time to develop and learn his craft in reserve grade before coming to NRL. However, all is too late, and we may have jumped the gun on his NRL debut.

People are now saying he should be in reserve grade. I would not be fully against it because it could help him in the long run. However, his defense against the Roosters will be required next week especially. Some pro D Brown argue that D Brown will not gain confidence in reserve grade and is too far above their skill level. I don’t believe that. Obviously, being demoted can affect your ego, but if D Brown sets reserve grade on fire, he will gain confidence. If he is firing, it will help eels and himself in the long run. I wouldn’t say he would not learn anything because he is to good for reserve grade. 

Concluding statement: I was really encouraged by 2 of D Brown’s last 3 games (Dragons and Broncos). His defense is vital for us, and he is doing the job BA expects of him. As a result, I would not drop him to reserve grade yet.

 Team List next Week

 *This is if Waqa Blake is not fit.

 I am starting Kaufusi at lock. Essentially, I am playing with 3 props to start the game. We need to win the game physically at the start against Roosters. So just get Kaufusi to do what he normally does. You could move Papali’I to lock and Lane to the starting lineup, but I like Lane on the bench comes in as a middle. I also want Papali’I running at Walker ‘all night along.’