Eels Blogs

Both teams are vying for a place in history. The Eels have shown heart, but recently the Roosters have looked like rock-star Gods again and deserve favouritism in this match. But, both teams face potentially their greatest tests of 2020, so far. Naturally, bigger ones will come.

As much as many Eels' fans hate the Roosters, they're the reigning champions and are a lean, mean, well-oiled, fighting-machine, flexing their muscles, reminding everyone they're still The King, despite losing the likes of stars Cronk and Mitchell.The eye test, beyond stats, seems to show they're still a level above us, as good as we've played in patches.

Will the 2020 Eels' be the first Eels team to start 6-0 ?

History is against us. The Eels rarely defeat the Roosters. A win would better the efforts of the great teams of 83' and 86', as would the Roosters with a three-peat.

Last week, the Eels showed heart coming back from 0-10 down against the Panthers. That's something even the 1986 team couldn't do in R7 of that year, losing 12-16 to the Panthers after being down 0-10 at the break. And so for long last, it seems we have a really good team. Maybe, therein lies a challenge. It's been shown time and time again, we crack when it matters.

Vince Lombardi said he wasn't "remotely interested in just being good". He also had a hand in our Golden Era, too. His ideas influenced Jack Gibson's fertile mind to help take the Eels one step further from being a very good side in the late 70s and in 1980, to a great one from 1981.

Lombardi, didn't have any "trick strategies" to transforming the Packers a championship force after a decades of dissappointment. Like Gibson he focused on the fundamentals, even properly tying one's shoes. He only accepted players that played "every game to the hilt with every ounce of fibre",relentlessly chasing "perfection" knowing they, nor the team, would ever be perfect, but in the process would "catch excellence".

And as Shaun Lane admitted in yesterday's media review clip: "We have a point to prove this year". 

We have a poor recent record against them: losing 77-80% of matches over 11 years

The total score from the last three meets with the Roosters is 38-124, a horrific 41-13 losing average.

Since 2015, over the last five years, we have won 1 from 5.

Our last win, was more than four years ago, R18, 2016, when we won 22-18, at this ground in its previous life as Parramatta Stadium. But, it was when the Roosters were struggling, winning the spoon that year. Take away the spoon year and we haven't beaten them for six years, since R6, 2014, 14-12 at this ground in its previous life. We've struggled against them for quite some time, even to scrape a win.

They pose threats from all over the park

The Roosters' still have the best attack in the competition, to go with their a defensive toughness. They epitomise what Lombardi and Gibson were on about.

If we don't stop Tedesco, the omnipotent game-buster, it's game over. A matter of how much by: 20 points, 30 points? He's omnipresent: Everywhere on the field. And then it's limiting his sphere of influence because he'll create opportunities around him. But, it's not just Teddy. They pose dangers everywhere: middle, left, right edge; with direct, hard, fast running with plenty of bodies in motion getting to the advantage line.

They ruthlessly execute. Unpredictably, switching from a left to right-side attack and back to the middle, in a blink, with Keary and Flannagan firing bullet passes to each other probing for space. It's something we have seen Moses and Dylan developing in patches.

Our left edge: Lane, Dylan, Jennings and Sivo need to be on task. Their right-side attack is radioactive. Last week, Keary and Tedesco fed Angus to two tries, against the hapless Dogs. They had no answers. Also, Manu and Brett Morris, outside them, have plenty of skill and pace to cause damage. Conversely, we all know what our left can do with good ball, in motion. Keary would be an obvious target. And we all remember when Sivo ran over the top of them and scored two tries in the last meet.

On our right edge: Moses will get another workout against Cordner and company. Yet, Moses' improving defence coupled with Matto, our Thor-like brunette, have been great to date. Our outside men will need to mark up against Tedesco who will likely lurks as a receiver or to set up Morris or Topua. It would surprise me if the Roosters don't target kicks for Tupou, on this edge, up against Fergo. Eventually, our right edge orchestrated by Moses, aided by Matto's offloads, should become a radioactive weapon. Let's hope Waqa, last week's saviour, is given some clean ball to weave his talents again, though he may find it harder against Morris. Let's also hope he's keeps his tackles lower as he's been pinged a few times. He's an extraordinary athlete, Waqa.

In the middle: they have Veteran Waerea-Hargreaves returning, providing good go forward and experience, whilst we lost the suspended Evans (Oregon Kaufusi in), who has been great for us off the bench generally. The Roosters have plenty of thrust and grunt from the likes of JWH, TKO, Liu, Collins. Also, Tedesco, that man again, frequently lurks around the rucks and fringes, scouting for blood. And Radley's not just an intimidating tackling machine, he's hard to stop around the rucks, and he has an offload in him. If you recall, in last year's R3 encounter, it was Radley who nailed our coffin shut when he went through a yawning hole (between Alvaro and Reed) to score next to the posts. Conversely, our starters provide plenty of middle go-forward, Paulo, RCG and Nathan Brown, our tough guy in the middle. We'll need them on task, and on for as long as possible.

One area which will be interesting to see is if Moses and Dylan can take advantage of is any space around the rucks or fringes, to bust the Chooks open, providing opportunities for our support. They've been doing a great job of that this year, especially Dylan Brown, who's stepped up. If that happens don't be surprised to see the maestro of support, Gutho score a try or assist one off the back of that.

The kicking duels will be absorbing: Keary and Flannagan are dangerous, whilst Joey seems to have improved this aspect further. Last week's grubber by Flanagan to set up BMoz try in the right hand corner, was skillfully executed, as was Moses' grubber to set up a try. And if there's one team to challenge our bomb numbers it may be the Roosters. Due to the Joey influence we've put up a lot more bombs (30 to 11 by our opposition) looking for a result or to pin the opposition down. It would surprise me if Moses, Dylan, Gutho, and even Reed try to exploit the Roosters' fast moving defensive line, by kicking behind the line, with plenty of grubbers and even the odd chip kicks for themselves.

One aspect of the Roosters evolution this year has been the increase in the volume of their offloads and second phase play. Last year they ranked towards the bottom. This year they're challenging us, coming third for offloads (we're first). On this, Sivo also deserves praise, with his skill development. He's more than just a bulldozer.

Do we need to play more direct ?

Moses made a comment right after full-time that once the Eels started to play more direct, in the second half (obviously co-inciding with our starting middies came on), things started to come together. After that foundation was laid, the breaks came.

Firstly, in the form of one, two punch: five minutes of Waqa Blake magic between the 61st-64th minutes. Then a knockdown blow by Moses in the 68th, running to the advantage line he put in a pin point grubber to set up Matto. Admitedly, the bounce rivalled Warne's ball of the century to Mike Gatting in 93, but it wasn't just luck. Twenty minutes or so before the match Mitchell Moses was out practising his kicking game. Being good enough isn't good enough, for Moses. And perhaps Joey's influence has been more helpful, and quicker, than we expected.

In my mind, we've looked the best when we've played a high-energy direct game, running straighter lines, with bodies in motion to the advantage line, coupled with crisp passes that can even breach fast moving defences. The Roosters are masters of that. Even the Dogs, managed to bust the Roosters a few times last week doing that.

At times against the Panthers and during the course of the year, we've been caught flat footed, looked bereft of ideas, direction-less, and subsequently been easy pickings for the defence, especially when we are in good field position or in the opposition's red zone. And though it beefs up our possession percentage holding the ball and passing it around, it's not usually threatening if we're going sideways or backwards.

Part of the issue, is once Paulo, RCG and Nathan Brown are off, like in the early parts of the second half last week, we lack a their thrust and direction until they come on. Nathan Brown showed how effective he can be when he's running direct and good lines, at speed. His rampage run in the 67th minute is one for his career highlight reel, one of many. He was everywhere, too. Floating in cover, and being a second pivot out in the edges at times (he produced the pass for Waqa's first try, and it's something he does regularly).

The other issue here, is we have slower play the balls than the Roosters (3.79secour  to 3.38sec, they had 3.28 seconds against Dogs). We've been slower than our opponents in every game, so far, unlike the Roosters. This gives the Roosters an extra edge at the ruck. Like a thousand cuts, you eventually break the opposition.

Defence and composure: will we manage the danger periods ?

To reinforce an earlier point, we'll need to watch the danger periods: 10-15 minutes either side of the break and the last quarter fade, when facing better teams that are in-form. It's then "fatigue makes cowards of us all" as Lombardi quipped, Nathan Brown admitted as much coming back under the new rules, in yesterday's media clip, noting an additional fatigue factor.

Those danger periods are something that we need to watch against the Roosters, who can hurt you quickly. It happened in last year's R3 game against the Roosters. Between the 60-72nd last time, following some errors in our red zone (starting with a Fergo error) and good field positions, they went from 14-18 down to 32-18; three tries, 18 points in 12 minutes to end the game.Tedesco and company peppered the right, peppered the left, then they peppered the middle and we couldn't hold the line. Once they put on the after burners, we cracked.

We also saw shades of a fade in our R4 match against Manly, whom almost snatched the game from the jaws of defeat in the last quarter. 

Ben Cummins was also the ref in that Manly game and will be the whistle-blower again this week.

Part of the issue we had against the Panthers, either side of the break is our bench wasn't that effective. When our starting props and Brown were off we were directionless in the middle, losing command until they came on (Junior and Brown came back on in the 51st, RCG in the 56th). Brown, especially, was instrumental in his return, with high-energy bursts and hard runs; less of those sideways meanderings. We're a far better team with him in the team and more so in that kind of mood.

However, our composure, patience and defence has improved this year, especially our goal-line defence, desparation and scrambling defence, and players like Moses, Gutherson, Dylan Brown, Reed have all stepped up a notch this year. However at times, we still have a propensity to lose focus and drop off tackles, which could undermine our chances when put to the sword. The Roosters' rarely have that issue.

Last year they had one of the best missed tackle ratios (8.5%), whilst we were second worst (10.5%). This year the Roosters are continuing on with that consistency (8.3%). Meanwhile, we are showing some improvements (9.5%). Last week was one of our best showing in some time (only 5.8%; only 20 missed tackles over 346 tackles). Meanwhile, the Panthers regressed ( they were the worst in 2019, at 10.7%, marginally worse than us) with a plethora of missed tackles last week (38 missed tackles from 361 tackles, at 10.5%) helping the Eels to bust them open in a short window from the 61st to 67th, to steal the match from 0-10 down.

This game is a litmus test, for us.

If we can't stay with the in-form champion and go down in a heavy knockout, it could challenge our inner belief of being a bonafide contender and take us some effort to get back up. Especially, after putting up so much effort to get where we're at. As Jack Gibson noted: "talent is secondary to whether players are confident". We've shown a stiffer chin in 2020 with better goal line defence than last year and have yet to suffer an awful knockdown. But, we've still shown glimpses of wobbly legs and are a work in progress. Will we be able to do the unthinkable and pull-off a boilover ? Can we get better or will we just be a good team ? Will we make a point?