Sorry for it being late, had to make way home from the game and get settled at home before starting this.
Overall, bit of an odd game overall, mixed emotion of great to poor to average to decent in terms of performance throughout the 80. Towards the middle of the 1st half is when Gold Coast really hit their gear and then got the lead within 5 mins after the break but sort of put their foot off the pedal, holding onto the lead so to speak. We had more ball in the second half and could not really make divots other than getting up to their own line. A win is a win, it is round 1 of 25 and seen teams lose their first game and win a comp (Roosters).
Most Impressive:
Reagan Campbell-Gillard: A good to quiet first half, but really set flying in the second half right when we needed him. He added that go forward in attack and aggression in defence leading to a few forced errors. RCG was to me the best on ground for us today, 179 metres running was essential to get us in field position to retake the lead in the second half. Reg showed his value in the team today.
Reed Mahoney: This little bastard again makes me more and more angry at management for not getting a deal done. Reed did not run as much as he did last year but his passing and kicking was on point today, Reed's aggression in the middle of the second half showed his commitment and seriousness to this team. Reed was relentless, including a period in the second half where a kick was placed into the in goal and he was up in Campbell's face before he even picked up the ball, he was everywhere at some stages. Again did not run as much but still played well, defensively he was phenomenal, not much getting past him and forcing some mistakes.
Sean Russell: The hat-trick hero, good ol' Rusty was excellent in the first half. Showed he is a natural footballer, the stage is not too much for him, his hit-ups were strong, his speed on the edge was quick and has natural instincts to get low when diving for that corner. Shame he got hit in the ribs, as this is a wonderful opportunity to get that wing spot full-time, Russell has the goods as a footballer and the more games he plays the better, as for any player, but with the competition of Sivo and Dunster this was a chance for Russell to get as many games as possible to stake his claims. He will be back, but still 3-4 games less then he should have had.
Shaun Lane: Nice, steady 80min performance from Lane. Not much he did wrong in the game, covering JA in the second half well also. 12 runs for 102 metres and 34 tackles is nothing to write home about, but for a player that has received numerous amounts of criticism from Eels fans, he was solid today.
Isaiah Papali'i: There is one thing on Papali'i that may be seen as a negative but will get to that later, Papa was great today. 8 tackle breaks, 193 metres in 80mins is wonderful. Papa showed he is not a one year wonder, he was busy and though he missed a few tackles he made a lot with impact also. The thing i will say though is i feel Papa would be better as a middle for us, whether at 13 or on the bench as an impact player. Now i know why that would not be smart atm, 1. even if he is better in the middle he is still the best back-row in the squad, 2. with Paulo, RCG and Brown in the middle, relegating Papa to the bench is wasted as you cannot move the other 3 onto the bench. But i feel Papa would be better suited for us in the middle, his motor is what is needed especially from the bench.
Ray Stone: Our best bench player by a mile, Stone was effective in his limited minutes, crazy to think it took 50 or so mintues to get on. His runs were needed late in that second half, Stone gave 150% as you would expect. 6 runs for 68 metres was exceptional.
Honorable mentions: Gutherson, Blake and Brown.
Most Disappointing:
Bailey Simonsson: Knew this was coming, he was not good today. Better in the second half, not writing him off it is game 1 into a three year deal. But he was not great. The two Sami tries were not great from him, the high ball and the one on one attempts were poor. The Kelly try with the three on one overlap was not his fault, but there was not a lot he did today to get him off this list. Again i am not giving up on him, but i comment on the game not what i feel about the player overall (i.e. Mahoney hate he left but said he was amazing).
Jakob Arthur: Get the pitchforks out, but JA was not good today. A few wayward kicks and passes, a few missed tackles, it was not JA's day. His inclusion disrupted the flow of our attack and never seemed to really get up to speed of the game coming in late. Now i do not place blame of him being in the game and his performance, that is on BA for naming him plain and simple. JA has heart and effort and i am still out on whether he can be a great player or not but today did not do much for his supporters. Still room to grow of course.
Will Penisini: Not a bad game, but just a 'meh' performance from Penisini. Not sure if it is the inexperience or simply not his type of game, but i though Penisini would be a massive addition to our attacking approach of winning the ruck with his dummy half runs and he had a few good runs and tackles also, but there was some miscommunication with Simonsson in defence that were costly. He is 19 and i am adament he will have a very healthy NRL career, but today was a day where i thought i would see more.
BA's bench: I felt the impact of the bench today was sub par. Makatoa and Kaufusi were fine without being special, Stone was the pick of them and JA was more likely not used how he was supposed due to Russell's injury, or maybe he was used the way he was supposed to. But i felt the impact of the bench was not what is was supposed to be. Now out of the players named, only Kaufusi is seen as a true impact player but felt his effort was there but did not make the impact when needed, you felt Paulo and RCG were off the field, i mean they are origin quality players so of course you would feel it but i felt it as a momentum shift for us. Stone came on late and showed great impact. Next week Brown and Niukore come in to strengthen the bench, so more likely Niukore and Matterson will partner Makatoa and Kaufusi against Cronulla, unless Niukore plays centre with Blake on the wing for Russell then Stone or JA will regain their spot on the bench.
Russell's injury: What an inconvience for Russell and our squad. Russell, as mentioned above, was looking the goods and was set for a big first half of 2022, this injury slows that down a bit. But now puts us into a spot of who to pick? The options are, 1. Naiduki as he is in our top 30, trials did not show confidence but who knows. 2. Zac Cini who we signed last week from Cronulla pre-season, smaller type winger who has 4 NRL games under his belt so has that in his favour but believe Naiduki would be picked over him due to his top 30 deal. 3. Blake to wing and Niukore at centre, leaning more towards this one but would rather Niukore on the bench for impact. 4. Perham on the wing, something BA did not say on to, he is a footballer and i believe wing would not be out his depth and would give him some much needed game time. Is it worthwhile getting a transfer? i mean maybe but Russell might be out for 4-6 weeks, if Perham works i say leave him there, he has quality and give us a reason to play him.
Just clarifying, just cause a player is in disappointing does not mean i thought they were awful or bad, it could mean that and i would say it but it can be simply expected better or feel there is room for improvement.
Replies
Well I was working at the game, and by the start we had, I thought we would have a comfortable and decent win. Titans played well, but our edge defence was really bad. I could see the game on the TV and titans killed us on the edges. Really embarrassing that we conceded 28 points in round one alone..
Defence wins games and we were lucky to win today's game..
The issues with our defence on the edges were the same as last year, cramping up along the middle and shifting to cover the outside, turbo would love the long ball to Garrick with that
It works with massive wingers like Sivo who can push them out but Simonsson was struggling with it
Sitting in the stands there were a few occasions where I heard everyone around me say WTF. It's a different game watching on TV but from the stands the Eels looked like they didn't want to be there. They were slow and dropping off tackles at a rate I don't think Iv'e seen in a long time from the Eels. I also can't believe nothing was done about the knees to Sean Russell's ribs. Happy to take the 2 points when I really believe we didn't deserve it. It's time for a new defence coach because I agree with LB, the edge defence look lost.
I do not think they didn't want to be there Jim, i think they started panicking when they fell behind and lost momentum (sound familiar?). It was a little reminiscent of 2018 Round 1, we led 14-0 after 25mins, leading to 24 unanswered conceading points and lost. Now we did not lose but it reminded me of that, that pre-season we were touted for big things, got a good start and put the foot off the pedal quickly with momentum shift, it started with a Waqa Blake freak of a try in 2018, yesterday it was off the Gutherson knock-on from the kick-off.
Not knocking BA, but it seems we fall into the same traps as a team each and every year, believing our own hype, panicking when we drop a lead. Granted earlier Eels teams under BA would have lost yesterday and we did not, we looked a little more composed yesterday but still could not make a dent in the Gold Coast defence in that second half.
If your theory is true Jim that they did not want to be there i wonder why, as your think the ones who would be like that are the ones that are leaving yet they (Mahoney, Papali'i and Stone) were the ones who gave their all.
Opacic scored 4 tries in NSW cup, I dare say he will get the nod and Blake pushed to Wing.
NSW cup form does not equal NRL performance. Opacic is decent but Nuikore centre may be better
Most disappointing = BA
1. JA is not a 14. Our attack always lacks penetration when JA is on. He just does not trouble the opposition. DB and Moses must stay our halves if they are fit. Don't destabalise our best spine. Maybe in 2 years JA will become a good enough half to change this but this year Moses and DB are by far our best halves and you do not FFCK with that.
2. BA needs to be at the table in setting the topics for the media. He needs to point out that we were hard done by when nothing was done by the foul on Rusty that took him out of the game. We hardly ever get the 50-50 calls go our way. We got them in the second half maybe to balance out the lack of penalty try etc for Rusty but now all the media pressure on the refs is against us.
3. As said above or defence out wide. We need a coach who can fix this. May be the defensive coach as well but buck stops at the head coach when it is an ongoing issue.
I do not blame BA for this at all Brissy, even with Ennis and McGregor there new voices take time to see full effect of their work.
I felt his decision to name JA was not a good one but mainly due to him not being ready yet, but Ennis and McGregor need time to implement their work, though the edge defence was an issue under BA's watch last year, who is to say McGregor is in BA's ear and suggesting change
JA in the team was a bad decision. He performed very poorly from what I could see..
With Sean Russell's injury, you really need to ask yourself what is best for the team. No doubt you could start by asking where each player is best suited. That would mean Niukori on the bench, Blake stays at centre and we find another winger. Agreed that in that case Perham would make sense, especially given he has played fullback (so should be able to slot in at wing). By having Blake go to wing for more than just a couple of games does not make sense. He is a very good centre, but probably mediocre winger.
I don't know what the plan was for JA, but he really needs to spend a few months playing Reserve Grade. He has a number of things to work on and it's a little unfair to expect him to do that playing NRL.
Yesterday's game was not pretty, but we found a way to collect the 2 points. We would have lost that game a few years ago. Just need to learn from the errors and move on.
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