Another round and another win, though not convincing it was a win nontheless and the old adage comes out "if that was Parramatta 5 years ago we would have lost" and that is true but is it acceptable? It was poor weather but not to the point where it effected the completion percentage, 88%. 53% possession also makes it a little disappointing that it took three goes on Manly's own line with twelve men to break past them. Yes it is a win, but we are at the stage of our developement under BA where every game is a should win as we are that type of team. We strive to be, like every other club, like Melbourne & Penrith, though losing games or nearly losing games to teams below us is not the standard to be accepted week in week out, after losing to the Roosters who are a top 8 team we should have been up more than what we were on Friday night. 18 missed tackles to their 27 is a massive gain from prior weeks and 22 offloads which have consistently gone up week by week.
Most Impressive:
Mitchell Moses: My man of the match, Moses was good without being great. When he was off we went to full one out mode, we were lost and Brown was lost (which is not great), but towards the end looking for something to help get us over the line Moses was active and did not do too much wrong getting us there, including slotting home a beauty of a kick.
Ryan Matterson: Went from not wanted really anywhere for 2023 to Origin Bolter. What a turnaround year for Matto, really made a bench spot his own with 177 metres running again this week. It is the consistency that has been the most pleasing element of his game.
Will Penisini: Depsite a few defensive errors early in the game, Will is getting better and better. The fact he holds his own so well for a 19 year old is astounding, 135 metres is much better for a centre where early in the year he was only racking up 70-80 metres which is not ideal. Will is only gonna get better too which is exciting, wonderful dive for the match winner also.
Clint Gutherson: Saved a great game for his 150th, 177 metres, 4 tackles breaks, 1 try assist and 3 offloads. Nice performance and more energetic one than we've seen of Gutho recently.
Honorable mentions: Papali'i.
Most Disappointing:
Bailey Simonsson: Oh boy, rough first half for Bailey. Attacking wise was the same as usual, fine without being spectacular. Defence though, well yeah. The first Garrick try pushing up when Penisni had already was either miscommunication, poor judgement or both. The Harper try where he latched onto Turbo and completely missed him was bad, especially to the fact we had 12 at that point. It is a shame after the game Simonsson had against Penrith, i think he can rebound, well you would hope so against his old club.
Nathan Brown: Something is not right about Brown this year, dropped to the bench and did not come on til late in the second half. He is out of favour, not saying it is a bad thing but disappointing considering the player Brown was and can be. 11 runs for only 70 metres is put it bluntly is bad for an impact forward, you'd expect a forward to make 8-10 metres per run, he only made a little over 6 metres per run. Not sure if Brown is effected by his off-season surgery or is lacking confidence but hopefully he can get out of it.
Dylan Brown not taking control: When Moses went off people said Gutho would just take over, ummm why? If Munster went off Hughes would take over and Pap would do his thing, Cleary off Luai takes over, Keary goes off Walker takes over. Teams lose a 7 their 6 takes over, for us Gutho took over and limited our attack, fair enough it was limited without Moses in general but Brown needed to take control in that time and did not, if he is a player that warrants 800k-1 mil a year, he needs to step up in control as he may go to a club with the cash and they will look at him to take over if things go sideways and Moses wont be there to take pressure off him.
Des outburst: Sorry Des, the RCG lift and Perham head high were penalties, simple as that. I have been a firm believer of you can have a rule so stupid and bad but as long as it is consistently policed by the refs 100% then that is the rule unfortunately, contact with the head though can be stupid is a big no no. Stupid as in he was slipping or arm was wrapping or barely hit him or he was not concussed. We weren't that good but still got the win, did not say we did we to hang on instead they were robbed, do not think so.
Now onto Canberra, were we have lost 10 of our last 11. Canberra are not heading into form, however that could work in our favor. We know what to expect, if they get off to a fast start it was expected, unlike Wests where it came out of nowhere. For the first time i got this out after the team list, but would have same 17 but Sivo in for Perham, instead it is Blake who returns early which is great, Sivo getting an extra week to get fully fit, fine by me.
Replies
I would say Simonsson has turned out to be a disappointment but I said when we signed him that he is bog average and I still stand by that.
The hit on Perham was a great tackle but as the rules state you can't make contact above the shoulders. It wasn't intentional however contact was made with the head so it was a fair call. The Keppie penalty was a no brainer. Moses got 10 for barely touching Turbo on the back so in comparison, Keppie was lucky not to get sent off.
It was one of those games that even though we won, it didn't feel like a win. We should be destroying teams Luke Manly at the moment especially after they lost Turbo.
We definitely need to lift our game.
Yes BEM, though it was accidental and not meant to harm pure desperation tackle, it was illegal in the rules of the game as soon as contact with the head.
You are right, when the game finished it was more relief than jubilation, felt somewhat empty like "glad we got there, but didn't need to be like that".
Mate, Manly should have won that game. They were the better team.
But I think back to times we were the better team and lost - i think it happened to us at least twice against Manly.
So I'm thoroughly enjoying payback.
I'm happy enough with Simonnson.
He's improving and is running stronger than he was when the comp started.
Funnily enough, Mitch didn't pick up any Dally M points for this game. Reed Mahoney was top billing (3 pts), however I don't recall him doing anything particularly outstanding
Reed was actually not bad to me, mid second half he started running and looked a lot better as a unit in attack.
I went to the game on Friday night. First time I have seen the Eels play at CommBank stadium. What a wonderful rugby league venue. Couple of things I noted:
Manly were very good. I thought we did well to stay in touch and then come over the top of them in the last 20 minutes.
I don't think the first try to Perham should have been disallowed. I though he only had eyes for the ball. We deserved an early lead.
The penalty count could have been 15-2. I don't recall Manly ever getting onside. The Eels would generally get back in line with the referee. Manly refused to do this, their discipline in getting back to the defensive line was poor.
We struggled amongst our group to come up with a clear man of the match. RCG was solid, as was Papali'i. I thought Penisini had a good game as well. We had a great view of the match winning kick. Never looked like missing.
Sat next to the 1eyedeel himself and his wife. She must be so sick of people coming up to Phil saying "Hi, I'm so and so from the 1eyedeel website". He was riding the final kick from Moses home as much as anyone in the stadium.
Hard earned victory, well deserved.
Nice post. Great to read the view from someone at the game, you see so much more live... It did feel Manly were lucky with that pentalty count watching on TV.
R Mahoney was best on ground, hes service from dummy half was very good, and made some half breaks himself , he looked pretty dangerous, R Matterson was outstanding again, Gutherson was very good as well, Moses was good in the 2nd half done some good things.
B Simonson defence was very average, he rushes off he's wing way to much, I'd switch him to the centres to see how he goes, if does not improve then a few weeks in NSW Cup. He played centre at the Raiders sometimes and was quiet good.
N Brown looks pretty average this year, Ky Rodwell will be hes replacement in a couple of years
Great write-up, LB. Good read.
I am glad you mentioned Penisini. Considering his age & experience he is killing it. The big magic plays will come.
Most impressive for me was the mental strength to come back when we looked dead & buried. We never looked like winning that game. It was a great response to previous games where we have shown an innability to turn momentum & keep fighting when things were going against us. Moses nailing some big moments also.
Sorry LB, bit of a long post but interested in others thoughts on these points.
Most disappointing for me was the attack inside the red zone & general speed of the shifts. The attack we played with in the trial against Panthers & against Dragons / Storm seems to have vanished. We relied on offloads in breaking their line as opposed to shifts with the ball, good lines from our second rowers, set plays etc. Are we playing our cards close to our chest for now? Was it the weather?
And the biggest disappointment was that edge defence - which was seriously embarrassing. I know Simmonson made some bad calls, but even when he didnt, their shifts were getting around us easily & with minimal risk. We are then on the back foot trying to set our defensive line, which seems to be an issue for us this year in defending our line. We are not able to adjust from linebreaks & reset.
Some will say 'all teams defend this way' but I would argue that, or at least, I would argue that they do it a hell of a lot better than we do it.
So where is the issue? Honestly I dont believe its purely decision making by individuals, and I cant believe this is how BA plans it, so what is the issue there? Is it the line speed we are pushing in with? Are we not coming far enough / too far? Is it communciation? Lateral movement to slide once in?
We cant win a premiership with the edge defence the way it is unless we plan to score 30 points a week, including the Grand Final, and we wont against the best.