Eels Blogs

In his 1933 US Presidential Inauguration, in the middle of the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “the only thing we have to fear is … fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyses needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.” Parra fans are (again) in their own form of Great Depression: bottom of the 8, tough run home, maybe we will miss the finals? Roosevelt thought fear was all in the mind, a sensation to be ignored, not an object actually causing trouble. Roosevelt lacked the insight of the original author of the phrase, the French essayist Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592). Montaigne’s life was full of pain that was not simply in his head: he lost multiple children, was surrounded by religious and civil wars, and lived every day with the kidney stones that would kill his father and which he knew would end his time as well. Montaigne wrote in That to Philosophize is to Learn to Die (1580) that fear was more powerful than actuality. If we conquer fear, anything is possible. There is a lesson there, not just for forever-disappointed Eels fans, but for the team as well. Montaigne wrote that to learn how to fear, by embracing the external reality of precariousness, is to unlearn being a slave to fear. The Eels need to embrace the reality of the challenging run to a finals berth: it is not in their heads, it is a concrete thing in their way, and it is time to roll over it. Starting with the Storm. Welcome to Round 22.

Friday 28 July, Marvel Stadium, Melbourne, 8:00pm (AEDT). Lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation. Referee: Ashley Klein.

Teams

EELS: 1. Clinton Gutherson 2. Waqa Blake 3. Viliami Penisini 4. Bailey Simonsson 5. Sean Russell 6. Daejarn Asi 7. Mitchell Moses 8. Ofahiki Ogden 9. Brendan Hands 10. Junior Paulo 11. Andrew Davey 12. Bryce Cartwright 13. J'maine Hopgood 14. Luca Moretti 15. Joe Ofahengaue 16. Joey Lussick 17. Ryan Matterson 18. Haze Dunster 19. Makahesi Makatoa 20. Wiremu Greig 21. Ky Rodwell 22. Jack Murchie.

Head coach: Brad Broke System Arthur

STORM: 1. Nick Meaney 2. William Warbrick 3. Marion Seve 4. Young Tonumaipea 5. Xavier Coates 6. Cameron Munster 7. Jahrome Hughes 8. Tui Kamikamica 9. Harry Grant 10. Christian Welch 11. Trent Loiero 12. Tom Eisenhuth 13. Josh King 14. Bronson Garlick 15. Alec MacDonald 16. Eliesa Katoa 17. Tyran Wishart 18. Grant Anderson 19. Chris Lewis 20. Tepai Moeroa 21. Aaron Pene 22. Jayden Nikorima.

Head coach: Craig Bellyache

Notes: The Eels are still without Dylan Brown, RCG and Sivo, and lose Shaun Lane (again). Davey replaces Lane, Joey Lussick has been parachuted in as bench hooker, and the Eels have replaced Blake with a cardboard cutout of Blake who defends about as well. The Storm lose Sims to suspension, Nelson Asofa-Solomona to injury (helps the Eels), plus both centres Smith and Olam are out (both injured?), replaced by Seve and Tonumaipea. All up, both teams are without two starting outside backs and two starting forwards.

Observations from Last Week

Eels (vs Cowboys), 16-24 (L), 50% possession, 71% completion rate, 4 linebreaks, 37 tackle breaks, 32 offloads, 41 missed tackles, 9 ineffective tackles, 12 errors, 8 penalties conceded, 3 ruck infringements, 0 inside 10 meters, 0 sin bin.

Storm (vs Knights), 18-26 (L), 48% possession, 80% completion rate, 4 linebreaks, 36 tackle breaks, 8 offloads, 45 missed tackles, 17 ineffective tackles, 9 errors, 7 penalties conceded, 1 ruck infringements, 0 inside 10 meters, 1 sin bin.

Eels/Cowboys R19 Highlights HERE.

Storm/Knights R19 highlights HERE

You may recall the Pre-Contact Metres Per Run (PCM/run) is a measure of how far a player ran before anyone even tried to tackle him or her, and is one means to assess line-speed. Recall the formula:

The Eels and Storm were both last-round losers who nevertheless won the line-speed battle. So other factors come into play, and one can make a case that intensity and desire were the other factors in each team’s loss.

Recall figures differ a little depending upon whether we use nrl.com or foxsports.com.au. Over at nrl.com the Eels’ PCM/run figures yield Eels 6.18 versus Cowboys 5.83, whereas over at FoxSports.com.au the Eels’ PCM/run figures yield Eels 5.68 versus Cowboys 5.39. Different numbers but approximately the same difference of 0.35 vs 0.29, suggesting the numbers are adequately catching that the Eels did not lose to the Cowboys due to lack of defensive line speed. Both teams operated with good line speed, but the Cowboys had the greater line-speed when the game was there for the taking in the first half: the Eels’ PCM/run was 5.52 in H1 and 5.82 in H1, whereas the Cowboys' PCM/run was 5.58 in H1 and 5.22 in H2.

The ‘other factors’ in the Eels/Cowboys game appeared to be a) the Eels left-side defence fell apart (mostly coincidental that Waqa resumed defensive duties on the left wing, he made three errors but missed no tackles), and b) the Eels’ intensity and discipline was not up to the task in the first half. The Eels missed almost three times the tackles as the Cowboys. The Eels' 4 penalties conceded and 6 errors gave them a 71% completion rate versus the Cowboys’ 80% completion rate. Note the Cowboys bumped their completion rate in H2 to 90% while the Eels played Offload-Ball (24 offloads in H2) on their way to a 73% completion rate. It may have all got a bit manic without necessarily being effective: for instance, Penisini had 11 tackle breaks for only 51 post-contact meters. What impact might a sub-par poor completion rate have against the Storm? Possibly, undoing other efforts?

Can the Eels take any inspiration from the Knights defeating the Storm last round? According to foxsports.com.au the Storm’s PCM/run was 6.74 in H1, and 5.38 in H2. The Knights’ PCM/run was 6.06 in H1, and 5.26 in H2. By those stats, the Storm had the greater line speed in each half but trailed 12-18 at half-time and lost the second half 6-8. The story here is two-fold. One, sin bins matter. Sims (Storm) was sin binned in the 35^th minute. The Knights scored 14 unanswered points while Sims was in the bin: tries in the 36^th and 39^th minutes to go from trailing 10-12 to an 18-12 lead at half-time, then a further converted try in the 45^th minute just before Sims returned, to lead 24-12. Hence the second point is that while the Storm scored again (53^rd minute), the Knights held them out for the final 25 minutes of the match. Bellyache suggested “it just looked like they wanted it more than us … they out-worked us” and that maybe the Storm got “complacent”.

Fear & Loathing in Eel Land

There is no denying that the Eels are thus far in 2023 under-performers. Fate has not been kind to the Eels: handed a tough draw (including early games against teams coming off the bye, no byes during Origin)), injuries and suspensions, some suspensions self-inflicted, missing spine players regularly, and little depth in the outside backs. Still, the Eels have been under-performers, objectively. The Eels thus need to conquer their external challenges, turning their fears into roadkill.

First, the Eels have not fared well against the Top 8, but they will need to beat Top 8 teams to secure their finals spot. The Eels sit on 24 points, and if we add 2 points from the R27 bye = 26 pts, that leaves 10 pts to play with from 5 games: Storm, Dragons, Broncos, Chooks, Panthers (then R27 bye). Will just beating the Dragons and Chooks be enough? 30 points? Unlikely.

Table 1: fear the Top 8*

* I have included the Bunnies (9^th) because Eels and Bunnies are each on 24 points.

Note the Storm fare much better against current Top 8 teams.

Second, even when we extend the comparisons to those teams still in contention, defined as any team with 20 or more competition points at end of Round 21 - and thereby excluding the Dragons, Dogs and Tigers - the Eels still fare poorly. Thus, time to pick up the slack against all contenders. Note the Eels cannot drop a game to Chooks in R25 and expect it won’t cost them big time.

Table 2: fear the contenders.

Note, again, the Storm have a better (winning) record against contenders.

Third, the Eels should squarely face the fact they are on a slide, and reverse course. Previously I outlined how the Eels were improving, measured over three distinct stages of the season. Yet entering their fourth and penultimate stage (finals as the last stage), the Eels have went backwards.

Table 3: fear the slide.

Fourth, the Eels are front runners, but not every game will go perfectly right from the start. The Eels thus need to overcome their habit of trailing and dying.

Table 4: fear the Trail.

Fifth, the Eels are - in a weird way - more consistent than the Storm but less able to convert that consistency to victory. Look at the margins, Rounds 1 to 21 inclusive. I have excluded the Dragons, Dogs and Tigers because they are all also-rans already.

Table 5: fear the lack of conversion.

The Eels either win close or win big, with nothing in between. The Eels typically lose by a one-score margin. That is not abject failure to convert tight contests, because the Eels have successfully managed some tight games for four 1-9 point victories. But there are seven losses that represent opportunities the Eels failed to ice. Contrast that with the Raiders: every single one of their wins is by 1-9 points. Of course, there is a flip side here, with the Eels having just two games where they lost by 10+ points, bested only by Penrith’s track record of no losses by more than 10+ points. Turning to the Storm, they are relatively evenly spread in results, measured by margins, though they are twice as likely to lose by 10+ than the Eels.

Sixth, the Eels were on track to have an attack that scores more than any other team per game and concede at a Top 4 rate per game. But the Eels have regressed in ‘Stage 4’ of the season and need to rediscover their mojo: a good balance of flair in attack and resilience in defence. Note from Table 3 above that during Stage 3 of their season the Eels were cranking out 35 points per game and conceding just 13 points per game, but in Stage 4 that has flipped to scoring 17 per game and conceding 31 per game.

Table 6: fear the increase in points-per-game conceded.

You will note it is probably not a coincidence that the current Top 4 are also the best ranked defensive teams. Thus, even though the Eels have the second best ranked attack, rank in attack is not as correlated to ladder position as is rank in defence. The Raiders are the outlier, a rank of 11^th and 12^th for attack and defence respectively, but sitting 5^th, so we must ask questions about the softness of their draw but also about their resilience within games to secure close victories. The Sharks are not an outlier, as they are on the slide due to their defence despite possessing the best attack. The Eels have three choices between lessons they wish to absorb. One, a ‘Shark Lesson’: you will slide down the ladder if your defensive rank slides down the ladder. Two, a ‘Raider Lesson’: if you can manage to keep contests tight, and become good at scraping close victories, the rest is gravy. Third, the ‘Bunnies Lesson’ is similar: see Table 5, the Bunnies concede just as many 30+ scorelines as they make. Which lesson is most instructive for the Eels going forward?

Seventh, both Eels and Storm score more through their left-side attack, and both concede more through their right side defence. When strengths and weaknesses between teams are evenly matched, maybe it just comes down to who rallies on the day and who holds their nerve the best? The Eels maybe need to just overcome themselves, and not have the game be one of those “we didn’t show up on the day”.

Table 7: Try Location Analysis (data from statsinsider.com.au)

Eighth, the Eels have a 60:40 W-L record against the Storm. A four-match winning streak was broken against the Storm in extra time in Round 1.

Yet at Marvel Stadium, the W-L record is 50:50.

The Storm beat the Eels 26-10 in the 2007 preliminary final (cheats!). But the Eels beat the Storm 54-10 in Round 20 of 2001. The Eels need to return to that form, please!

The Bottom Line

In previews in the past, I have made the analogy to Sybil, that it is sometimes like the Eels have multiple personalities. Well, it is the business end of the season, and just like in 2022, the Eels could slide out of the Top 8 and miss the finals. The Eels again need to face the question of who they are, or who they want to be, and be that team.

Go Eels!