PARRAMATTA star Nathan Hindmarsh says the Eels are ready to fight fire with fire as the side prepares for a brutal forwards onslaught from the wounded Sea Eagles in their blockbuster clash tomorrow.
With the Eagles reeling from the loss of irreplaceable strike weapon Brett Stewart, the Eels expect a fired-up Manly pack to continue the strongarm tactics that dominated the Tigers forwards in Monday night's 26-22 defeat.
The Sea Eagles unleashed the most physical performance of round one with a ruthless approach that left metre-eating prop George Rose suspended for a week and halfback Keiran Foran and hooker Matt Balin charged for high shots.
And Hindmarsh says the Eels pack are ready to lift the intensity to stop an ambush at Parramatta Stadium.
"We are prepared definitely for a physical game," the Parramatta workhorse told The Daily Telegraph yesterday. "And we are going to pretty much take them on wherever we can.
But Hindmarsh said there were no plans to start Tongan torpedo Fuifui Moimoi for what is sure to be a fiery opening to the match. "Poore and Cayless can definitely do a good enough job," he said."There are some big boys in their forward pack as well as [Steve] Matai on the edge there, so we're definitely prepared to take some hits. They were very physical against the Tigers and it will be the same on Sunday."
"We will just use him [Moimoi] the same as what we did last week. It's a bit of a luxury we have. Poorey and Cayless do a lot of the hard stuff and then we just bring Fuifui on when everyone gets a bit tired."
Bookmakers have reeled Manly from $13 to $21 in premiership markets following the loss of Stewart to a knee injury for five months and the club's depth will be further tested with NSW Origin winger David Williams sidelined for eight weeks with a broken collarbone as well as the suspension of Rose.
Although Des Hasler insists the Sea Eagles showed they could cope without their mercurial fullback, pointing to nine wins in 2009, the 2008 premiers also fell 10 times without the speedster and battled to score tries.
Michael Robertson returns to the No. 1 position but with Stewart sidelined Manly will now be forced to play a tighter, more forwards-orientated gameplan.
Hindmarsh said the Eels had to play smarter than last week's loss to St George Illawarra, when the side defended well but gave away too many penalties.
"Defensively they only scored two tries against us and with the amount of ball they had we took a bit out of that," he said. "We were happy with the way we defended but if we keep giving away penalties like we did on the weekend we are going to have to do it again on Sunday.
"We have to play smarter.
" We ran a lot one out and when we were under the pump a bit we panicked and dropped a few too many balls as well."
Hindmarsh admits the Eels are desperate to avoid another slow start to the season.
Replies
He gave the Dragons such a soft ride in the first half, just like last week.
It's interesting that Hindy calls it the Eels lack of discipline in giving away so many penalties.
I think Poore was dumb giving away that first penalty by getting in the face of Weyman. Other than that there seemed to be some pretty harsh calls going against us but not for us.
What im really hoping to see is Tahu dominating Matai. Not an easy task, but if any centre can... its Tahu!