This is what most of us have been calling for!!!!
Mortimer - halfback.
Mateo - 5/8th.
Robson - Hooker.
POSITIONAL CHANGES
The Eels need to be more effective out of dummy half. They need to advance the ball upfield with more conviction.
I think Parramatta miss their hooker from last season, Kevin Kingston. Sometimes you don't know what you've lost until it's gone.
With the loss of Kingston to the Panthers (thanks to the ridiculous salary cap rules we have in our game), Parramatta have no game out of the dummy-half position. They are not rolling their forwards over the advantage line as effectively as they did at the end of last season. They are not putting any pressure on opposition marker defenders.
The Keating brothers, Matt and Kris, are good footballers. Placing greater emphasis on their roles in the team is a must if the Eels are to consistently trouble opponents.
I reckon halfback Jeff Robson might be more effective working in a dummy-half role. Between the three of them there is a tag-team, dummy-half assault in there somewhere. The coach needs to extract it from them and give them prominence within the overall team formation.
Daniel Mortimer is a halfback. Start him there; teach him to play the position; persevere for as long as it takes.
I don't understand the role of the No.6 in modern rugby league. The five-eighth position is almost defunct in the framework of a lot of teams in the NRL. There are few genuine five-eighths in our league. This position is now regularly filled with players with limited playmaking ability or back-row body shapes with some skill but who offer more resistance in defence.
It's not my favoured style of footy but I get what coaches are trying to do. Feleti Mateo fits the bill here. He can be frustrating, but there is no doubt he can make things happen.
It's also high time Mateo started being held more responsible for his actions and started to play with greater understanding of consequence. It's professional football; he needs to start thinking and playing like a pro.
Pair him up with Mortimer in the halves and give them a basic repertoire of patterns and plays to execute. Give them the freedom to play off the back of good yardage created by their dummy halves. Teach them how to give fullback Hayne time and space.
Replies
I think this is code for Mateo is a lazy over hyped player who I dont know where to play but youve got him so stick him at 6 and dont resign him.
Smith didnt rate him, DA struggles with him and Gus bags him. 1-2-3 your out Mateo !
Yet he's left only one spot off the bench.
The optimum formation is Kris at six allowing Feleti to float. You have Kris and Feleti on one side of the ruch, Mortimer and Hayne on the other. If you can make it work, you've got two excellent support players nipping aorund the ruck and then two big, skillful playmakers hitting the fringes. These combinations can be absolutely devastating. Let's at least give it a chance to see if it works...
this will also work.
hes spot on bout our dummy half play not giving us any advantage. its really sloppy stuff there at the moment. give robbo a go matt keating cnt be getting wrapped just for making tackles, any hooker makes tackles its not justified he needs to be doing more in attack, but that aslo comes down to forwards bending the line back more, still, mk is not being as effective as he should be.
Morts. get, nd stay in the seven and get some confidence and he should be fine.
I know he can do the exact same things at lock but its what he isn't doing at the moment that warrants a move to the halves and that's the point that Gus is basically making here.
Really its a mental thing, at 6 he has to take more responsibility for the direction of the teams attack
But as Golling says above I think what it comes down to is Anderson is struggling with giving him that much responsibility. I can tell you that other teams, like the warriors, won't have a similar problem.
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