Curled up in the foetal position, the noise is getting louder from some of our punters. Drop Pezet. Move him on. He’s been labelled “a mistake” by some, along with the usual tomatoes thrown at R&R, the team, and the front office. But not Talyn Da Silva this week. We are not just loyal, but passionate.
Expectations were high across the rugby league community following our form late last year and winning the Pre-Season Challenge.
But we haven’t put together an 80-minute performance, hitherto. We’ve started poorly and fought off the back foot on the ropes. Hard yakka.
But two from three is not a bad winning return. And it was more than luck.
Image: Tallyn Sa Silva, scores two tries in a twenty minutes cameo; you can't coach speed.
Blowtorch
We’ve opened the season against the defending premiers, a perennial powerhouse who have never lost a round one in 24 years, the current premiership favourites, and the desperate Dragons trying to avoid 0–3.
It doesn’t get much harder.
Round one wasn’t just a loss against the Storm. It was C4-demolition.
408 tackles to 280 (+128) is a defensive load that blows up dam walls. The floodgates open.
Fatigue that doesn't just slow you down: it turns momentum into a landslide. A vicious cycle of errors and poor decisions.
Tackle Difference vs results (using nrl.com stats)
Sharks | +52 tackles | lost by 28 (38–10) to Dolphins (R3)
Knights | +60 tackles | lost by 26 (38–12) to Warriors (R2)
Raiders | +77 tackles | lost by 34 (40–6) to Warriors (R3)
Cowboys | +85 tackles | lost by 28 (44–16) to Tigers (R2)
Roosters | +97 tackles | lost by 24 (42–18) to Warriors (R1)
Titans | +102 tackles | lost by 14 (30–16) to Cowboys (R3)
Eels | +128 tackles | lost by 48 (52–4) to Storm (R1)
The damage was already done, but to keep them to one try in the last 15 minutes with 12 men was miraculous. An early sign.
Many put a line through the Eels then and there. The 52-4 loss was even worse than last year. Sportsbest immediately dropped us from equal eighth hopefuls at $21 to bottom four at $51. Darren Kemp suggested the Eels had been reading "their own headlines."
Fightbacks
The last two weeks have been the same movie. By the 27th minute in both games, we were getting bashed up.
Down 20–6 vs Broncos. 14–6 vs Dragons.
We made around 60 more tackles by then. A ten-set difference.
Image: Fatigue makes cowards of us all. Moses, Paulo, Williams, Fox, out. Haunched over. Hands on hips. Structure in disarray. Little talk. The much-maligned Pezet one of the few still moving, following the ball like a terrier.
Straight out of Tim Sheens’ playbook. Fatigue them early, win it late. The difference? They were already winning.
Even Mitchell Moses admitted on Triple MMM after the Broncos win he felt early it was heading for a repeat of the Round One debacle. So did I. He also admits Pezet is a seven, which is why we saw him switch left and right, and play first receiver often in that game.
But in both games, we didn’t follow the script that felt a fait accompli.
We stayed alive.
We clawed our way to halftime leads in both, then overcame second-half surges when we looked likely to lose it again.
Chart: Linespeed (Pre-Contact Metres). Eels (Blue) vs Dragons (red)
The Dragons’ big men bullied us. Dominated. They had faster line speed for most of the match. At least, until possession swung from 60-70% their way, to finish up at 50-50. Then, they dipped and imploded.
We lost Hopgood in the 27th, then Samrani in the 39th, and Guymer shifted to the centres. The rebuilt right edge looked vulnerable against the Dragons’ left edge, with Suli and Luciano running rampant.
But the Dragons repeated their own script, just as they had the week before against the Storm when the game was in their grasp. Errors. Panic. Poor game management when possession swung the Eels’ way.
Image: Williams and Ryley Smith made 50 tackles each against the Dragons.
Gus Gould, who tipped the Dragons and called the game, was impressed with the Eels’ character.
“Real Grit”
“Real grit from Parramatta to stay in it and win the way they did," he noted in this week’s Six Tackles.
"I think Jason Ryles will be really happy with the grit they showed.
“Particularly in the last twenty minutes where they were down on troops, down on numbers, and still found a way to win.
“That’s a good quality for them,” Gus concluded.
We rose off the canvas after the biggest Round 1 knockout loss in our history.
We rose again after being bashed early in both games and on the ropes in the second half. Fatigued. Off our feet.
In those two wins, we didn’t play great footy compared to the last two months of last year or the trials. But we took our chances, scrambled well, held our nerve, and managed the game better.
That’s resilience. Heart.
The legs were weary, but we didn't lose our heads. The Dragons and Broncos did.
But we’re also playing with fire.
There are "lessons" we need to learn, as Jason Ryles reminded us post-game.
The reasons and the fixes behind these poor starts flirting with fatigue-induced blowouts, the defensive vulnerabilities, and what the grit is compensating for remain questions time will answer.
The Biggest Test
This week we face the best.
Penrith aren’t just winning. They’re suffocating teams. Strangling them. Surgically. And none have won the week after.
26–0 against the Broncos, the reigning premiers.
26–6 against the Sharks, perennial contenders.
40–4 against the Roosters, one of the premiership favourites.
What will they do with us? Matty Johns described them as playing with a “chip on their shoulder.”
They don’t let you back in once they’re on top, and if we start the same way again, it’s doubtful there’ll be a comeback this time.
Replies
Daz and Coryn. It's a lovely theory, gentlemen. Sure, sprint coaching helps. But turning Pezet or Paulo into Usain Bolt? The eggs might start flying faster.
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