A return to BankWest stadium for the eels today and no doubt the team has been eager all week to get back on the park and erase what turned out to be a nightmare at Lottoland last week.
This week sees us play the in form Warriors with such players as RTS, Luke and Green on display.
The 3pm kick off should provide a fantastic afternoon of footy with open play and a dry track.
Every week we say that this is a crucial game for the eels, but after that loss last week, this truly shapes as a big game.
For the Eels, it sees the debut for Waqa Blake in Eels colours and I can’t wait to see how he goes and combinations develop with Blake in them. I’m calling that Moses will send a few cut out passes his way and give him a few runs to help settle in.
This should be a great game and I’ll tip the eels by 10 and MOM Gutherson....he’s due.
GO YOU EELS!
Replies
Mannah is lucky to be playing NSW Cup. The guy is finished. Move on. All that said and you don’t even know parry is playing. Try checking the parra website some time
Mack, agree. From my perspective I believe he is a better player than Evans, this weeks team is a bit of an experiment though, its against a tough team that also wants to play semi's football and not far behind us either, Alvaro and Kafusi have been given a spot to play as props off the bench, depending then on how they go along with Evans, then Mannah should replace Alvaro on the bench against Saints the following week and Alvaro to be run on prop.
Could also be a good game against Saints to blood Stefano off the bench if one of the forwards fail, Tepi also needs to lift his game especially how to get up off the ground when in defence.
Yeah, not sure re saying BA is choking Pops, but I do recall jumping on the bash BA bandwagon after the thrashing by Melbourne. The fact is that BA has since been signed regardless of what anyone thinks and he’s actually had a lot of experience now no matta what we think, so we have to believe in him to some degree and there aren’t too many top line alternatives anyway.
I agree regarding players lying in the ruck. Not only is it lazy, but it takes the defensive line back to 11 or 12 men on the next play. I still maintain that we just don’t have enough big boys to take control of the ruck which results in us having to get in the way to slow it down. It’s basically a physics thing and why we are letting a few of our mid sized forwards go and chasing bigger players.
Agree Grunts, & Pops I don't see BA chocking also the aspect of laying in the rucks is something that is not just poor play but lazy poor & bad play, while some teams can get away with it as they seem to have immunity from the refs, the eels forwards have to have better defensive tactics. Watching parts of last nights game Rabbits and Dragons, one could see how the rabbits used generally just one of the big men in the tackles with a couple of smaller ones as aides, even against Vaughan but Graham attracted 2 of the bigger players. Prime aim of the big defender was to stop and hold the attack player upright and start the wrestle as the others came in, the one around the legs first off the tackle, something I have noticed with other teams, leaving two players primarilly to finish the tackle and then become the markers.
We have a few of the younger players in the side including a player that is having his debut in Blake and he could well be a bit rusty, Parry with one game under his belt, DB with 6 games, Kafusi with 9, also Mighty Mouse in Mahoney is still learning and plays above his weight and size but this could be a game where he is really tested.
While I would like to have seen Stefano given a run, to include another inexperienced player may be a bit of a hard ask though. If Evans plays another game like he did against Manly, then he needs to be dropped, however he had been ok before that game for a while.
I see and hope for a win but it wont be by a large margin, other aspect is that if the team goes into the match believing we are playing at fortress home ground, they need to remember they have also lost there, especially against a team they were expected to win over. Home ground is an advantage but one cannot take it for granted either.
The Eels to win by 10.
Warriors, 8 day turnaround - Eels 6 day turnaround. Unless our boys can explode out of the block and dominate possession for the first 20 minutes, we might struggle a lot to win this game. If we put on one of our top class "Bankwest" games today, then we will win by a huge margin, 30+. If its a slug-out either side to win by 8 points or less. Moses MOM, will play a blinder as our general. 3 Moses 2 D Brown 1 N Brown.
Eels win today 23+ and Storm beat Manly 23+ we jump into 5th spot and Manly drops to 6th. Even better if Penrith and the Broncos lose this weekend too.
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