Eels Blogs

Will the dream live on? Nervousness may be a understatement describing how some Eels fans may be feeling, especially if you look in the rear-view mirror without seatbelts. It’s sudden-death and the Eels are favourites $1.49 to $2.56 in today's sell-out at Bankwest on Sunday afternoon.

The Eels were impressive in last week’s win against Manly, whilst the Broncos were underwhelming, out-skilled and out-enthused by the Dogs last week. On that form the Eels should win, but the Broncos have the firepower and class to pull an upset breaking the hearts of long suffering Eels fans. After all, it was only yesterday, in R24 that the Broncos did exactly that, winning 17-16 in golden point.

 1. A Bankwest day game; Eels have the edge, except for refs

The Eels love the day (7W-2L). The Broncos not so much (1W-2L).

The Eels have won all their day games at Bankwest for a 9 from 11 game winning record at this ground; and have the equal best home record (along with the Roosters and Storm, all three at 9W-3L). In the Broncos last day game here at Bankwest, in R14, they were demolished 38-10.

Also, the Broncos have played very few day-time finals games: only 2 in the last 12 years (from 21 matches). Both of those day games ended up 30 points plus hidings: 40-0 to Storm, 2007 away; 48-18 to St George, 2018, home.

However, when it comes to both this week’s refs - Grant Atkins and Ben Cummins - the Broncos hold an advantage, statistically.

The Eels have lost the last two matches they have played under either Cummins or Atkins (Eels have a 32% record, Broncos 58%).

The only 2 games the Eels lost at Bankwest games (Dogs, Penrith) were both under Atkins and both night games, too. In those games Atkins blew 31 penalties to help shape stop-start, dour affairs.

We have lost the last 7 from 9 games under Cummins, and in over four-and-a-half years we have only won 2 home games under Cummins. The last time we won a home match with Ben Cummins was R7, 2017 more than two-and-a-half years ago. But, we did win our only game under Cummins this year (R2, Dogs, 36-16, at ANZ) and he only blew 6 penalties (3-3), which probably helped our attacking comeback against the Dogs in that game.

However, the Broncos have unhappy finals campaigns under both these refs – to even out the cause.

Under Cummins the Broncos have had heartbreaking finals losses: to Storm 30-0, 2017 preliminary final; and in the 2015 grand final 17-16 against NQLD in front of almost 83,000. Also under Atkins, the Broncos lost last year’s qualifying final v St George 48-18 at Suncorp.

The bottom line is – hopefully we won’t have as many costly refereering errors as the last time we met the Broncos at Suncorp in R24 under Ashley Klein and Peter Gough, losing 17-16 in golden point. It was marred by two critical errors that strangely went unpunished by ref boss Graham Annesley: an incorrect ruling on winning drop goal ( should have been a penalty for marker interference ) and an incorrect no-try ruling on Ferguson (incorrect forward pass ruling).

Time will tell what happens today - or if we get a Cummins stop-start affair to undermine a more free-flowing game suited to us - and who gets the rub of the green when it counts.

2. We can’t let the dream end so soon; second highest positional change

MATT Gillett will play his 200th NRL game.

Another milestone of sorts, is that the Eels rise from the wooden spoon to 5th place (11 positions) is the second highest positional rise up the ladder after a spoon year - quite an achievement. It’s a credit to Arthur, the team, the coaching staff and the club. So, it's not the time to end all that good work.

Incidentially, the 2009 Dogs (16th to 2nd) recorded the biggest positional rise, from the 15 teams throughout the game's 111 year history that have gone from spoon to finals  - putting aside the 2011 Storm and the 2003 Dogs whose preceding spoons were caused by salary cap scandals.

History is stacked against us, though.

Only the 1934 Wests team have won a title coming off a spoon – and no team has won outside the top 4 - since the NRL was formed in 1999. Nonetheless, teams have won the premiership from outside the top 4: the 1995 Dogs (from 6th) and Brisbane in 1993 (from 5th). However, the difference between the 2019 Eels and those teams is: those teams were littered with tough, proven origin and rep-quality players.

We’re going to need every ounce of courage, expansive play, “killer instinct” and back ourselves - to stand a chance.

3. Facing off, poor record finals: strangers for 17 years

In recent times, the Eels are ahead, winning the last 3 from 5 against the Broncos – although it’s 1-1 for this year at the moment.

Not surprisingly, it's been 17 years since they last faced each other in the finals (2002) – and only four times in the last 31 years, for 2 wins a piece.

All those four finals matches were close – no more than 10 points each: for a WLWL record. Broncos won 24-14, in 2002 at Suncorp (were behind 8-6 at halftime) the last time the two teams met. The Eels won 24-16 in the 2001 preliminary final at Stadium Australia. The Broncos won 16-10, in the 2000 preliminary final at Stadium Australia. The Eels won 15-10, in the 1998 major semi-final at Suncorp.

Both teams have had unhappy finals records in recent years.

Broncos have lost the last 4 from 5 finals games. They last won a finals match 2 years ago, a 13-6 victory over Penrith, at Suncorp, 2017.

The Eels have only had one finals campaign in 10 years: in 2017. And the Eels have lost the last 3 finals games they’ve played, bowing out of the 2017 finals with 2 straight losses. Limp.

4. Eels focus on mental side this year, releasing pressure: learning from 2017 mistakes

Inability to handle finals pressure has been an on-going issue for us in finals footy. We saw that in 2017. The 2001 grand final. 2005. 2009. It’s been a long time we saw the Eels play there best at the business end.

As such, Brad Arthur’s has tried to change his 2017 philosophy “it’s just another game” to let’s treat this as a “different" game: to relax a bit more, and enjoy the moment. The team flew up to the Central Coast for an overnight camp a week ago Sunday and Monday, played golf, had last Tuesday and Wednesday off, before re-focusing on the job ahead and returned back to Sydney a few days ago, on Thursday.

Also, Arthur has focused on team bonding a lot more this year. Who could forget the preseason bonding tears. I like the direction he’s trying to take the team – make it one where everyone plays for one-other, backs itself and plays with “killer instinct”. It’s trench-war comradery. 

Michael Jennings admitted: “It's a tighter group (in 2019, than 2017). We're just enjoying this moment, that's what we're doing. It just feels like there is not a lot of pressure going into the finals."

Only time will tell whether a relaxing a bit more and playing golf ends up working in the heavyweight arena.

However, the Broncos are also under pressure, too. Seibold was angry at last week’s performance and they’ve been hot and cold all year - in and out of the eight during the year, and often lambasted by the media commentators and the likes of Gordon Tallis.

But the Broncos play finals footy for breakfast and have an plethora of finals experience in the likes of Milford, Boyd, Gillett, Oates, Glenn, McCullough. The Eels have some less finals experience, but still have 7 players from the failed 2017 campaign in Moses, Nathan Brown, Takairanga, Moeroa, Ma’u, Alvaro, as does as Waqa Blake from his Penrith days; but that’s where the experience of Jennings and new-comer Ferguson, whom have won premierships, will help.

Both teams get some firepower back this week to help. The Eels get enforcer Nathan Brown back who is critical to the Eels success, tightening the of the middle defence, adding energy and class. Gun Broncos back-rower Joe Ofahengaue is back, too, to add starch. Losing Evans hurts the Eels, but we can't complain too much, as the Broncos still have TPJ out. O'Sullivan is out for the Broncos – forcing a Turpin-Boyd halves combo - but that doesn’t seem a big issue. The Boyd-Turpin has been the most successful of all 6 different halves combinations the Broncos have tried - winning 5 from 8, despite losing last week to the Dogs. Turpin has won 6 from 9 matches he’s played in the halves. All other halves combinations without Turpin have only secured 5 wins from 15 matches.

5. Contrasting styles and points of attack

The Eels rely on high-energy expansive footy and their big, powerful classy backline. The Broncos rely on brutal grunt with a delicate touch of class out wide.

The Eels have the third best attack and the most offloads of any team with Junior, Lane, Ma'u and Nathan Brown adding a nice blend of brawn and offloading creativity. The Broncos have the most tackle busts in the competition, unsurprisingly with wrecking balls like Haas, Fifita and TPJ who is still out. 

The Eels will struggle to out-grunt the Broncos in the middle – they’ll need to attack with expansive footy, as they did last week. Last week’s kicking games was also wisely distributed between Moses, Brown, Mahoney, and Gutherson in small bites, to less predictable than a last-tackle reliance on Moses - which the Broncos exploited perfectly in R24.

The Broncos still have enough class through the likes of Milford, Gillett, Boyd to win if their forwards dominate ours. Milford is hitting a bit of form, too, even if he isn’t quite as damaging as he once was. His kicking game was a factor in our R24 loss. Not just setting up Boyd’s try through a clever kick, but the first penalty goal – was instigated off one of his famous hard-to-handle hanger kicks.

Statistically, though, the Eels have both a better attack ( 90 v 73 tries scored) and better defence (79 v 83 tries conceded) – and should win.

Unfortunately, the game is played on grass and not paper or excel spreadsheets.

Also, statistically, the Eels right side attack with Moses, Ma’u, Waqa, Ferguson is the second best in the comp (after the ill-fated Sharks) and is likely to score, as it the Broncos’ right side being the fourth best.

Last week, the Eels left side deliberately peppered Manly’s right side with great results. And the result, Sivo’s hat-trick to win top try scorer in the regular season, is a feel-good story. The Eels left, in Dylan Brown, Lane, Jennings, Gutherson and Sivo, was outstanding last week in the win. This wasn’t altogether unexpected, as Manly concede the most of their tries down their right corridor, even before Elliot was served on a plate to Sivo (Manly concede tries 25% L, 21% M, 53%R).

This week, it wouldn’t surprise me if we see a good deal of the Eels’ left-side attack in motion again; and for the Broncos’ attack to be left-side heavy at times, as well.

It makes sense, as both the Broncos and the Eels both concede most of their tries down their right sides (Broncos conceding 29%L, 28%M, 43%R; Eels 28%L, 32%M, 41%R). It’s no surprise Dogs’ left winger Nick Meaney scored a hat-trick facing Broncos right side defence last week. Still, the Eels will almost certainly need to find a way to minimise the damage Broncos left edge, especially meta-human-wrecking-ball Fifita as well as Oates who can be damaging on the left.

Both teams are susceptible in the middle (Eels slightly more conceding 25 tries to 23). As such, it wouldn’t surprise me to see another try or two scored there. Last time, in R24, Evans scored the equalising try through the Broncos middle, at the death. Seggy also did create a few opportunities for the Broncos last week through the middle, last week, too and is one to watch. It would be good if Mahoney could utilise his nippiness around the rucks a little more.

Also, it wouldn’t surprise me to see the Broncos attempt a few Turpin or Milford kicks locally targeting the area around Jennings-Brown left-side to provide opportunities for their talented right-centre Kotoni Staggs to out-leap both men.

Moses' and Isaako’s goal-kicking boots may also become a factor if the game is close, as it did last time.

It will be an intriguing battle. And Lodge's promise of "fireworks" may cause a fiery encounter. Good to have Nathan Brown back. Hopefully, he won't hold back.

Bottom line

In short, it’s a case of which of the teams’ strengths will execute better and seize the momentum: the Broncos raw horsepower grunt or the Eels high-octane, expansive play - where “attack is the best defence.” Arthur's "killer instinct".

If the Eels don’t play some creative footy with second phase play they will be hard pressed to win.If the Broncos frustrate the Eels, and grind the match, the Eels attack it’s known to become frustrated, clunky, flat-footed, nervous and error prone which can dry up points.

And who will handle the pressure of sudden-death better ?

To quote 1986’s Highlander, the last time the Eels won the heavyweight title – there can only be one. Let that be the Eels.