Eels Blogs

Team Review: (8.5/10)

1. Clinton Gutherson (9)
   1. Great cut out pass for Sivo’s first try. His second try assist was a bit funny. Pretty sure the pass was intended for Opacic, but Papali’I just grabbed it and scored lol. This is what happens when you have bodies in motion at a quick speed. Good try in support
   2. Couldn’t do anything about either tries. Safe under the high balls. Saved a try when he hit Rapana’s hand causing him to drop it.
2. Maika Sivo (7)
   1. Dropped the ball. Easy walk over for his try. Tackled Aikens in the air as well. Dropped a bomb backwards but managed to hold young up and luckily got the ball back.
   2. No defense required, except when he came in on no one. Thankfully Opacic covered and threw the Raider into the sideline.
3. Tom Opacic (8.5)
   1. Annoys me when he runs from marker cause he barely gains any meters. Getting his combination with Sivo slowly. I like the idea of just giving Sivo the ball and seeing if he is able to create something such as the offload that led to Lane’s try. Good run to set up Gutho, but very shit defense by raiders to be fair. Dropped the ball and made a total of 3 errors.
   2. Defended well. Only threat he defused by putting the player in touch.
4. Marata Niukore (8)
   1. Watching his runs tonight, I can’t wait for him to go back to the middle. Ran with great aggression and bent the raiders defensive line. Not much attack down his way.
   2. Covered well. First try down his edge but was a 2 v 3 overlap due to the inside players not sliding well and Will Smith horrible defensive read.
5. Blake Ferguson (7.5)
   1. Ran hard. No chances for him to score. Looked shaky under the high ball as usual but never dropped any. Chirps a lot when doing the hard yards instead of playing the ball quickly. Makes it hard for the person doing the next carry cause the play the ball is slow.
   2. Couldn’t do anything about the first try. Took Rapana into touch with a good ball and all tackle.
6. Will Smith (7)
   1. Did his job. Kicked on the third tackle which was questionable. Did D Brown’s role in attack but not as good.
   2. Horrible defensive reads on a couple occasions which lead to line breaks in the first half.
7. Mitchell Moses (9.5)
   1. Great kicking game and running game. This is the “NEW STANDARD” for Moses.
   2. Good defensively.
8. Regan Campbell – Gillard (8.5)
   1. Played more minutes than Paulo. Some good tough carries.
   2. One of the players who weren’t in the defensive line for the first dry. Otherwise, his defensive game is one of the best as a forward.
9. Reed Mahoney (9)
   1. Nice kick in the first half. Kicked on a 6 again but I doubt he heard the very late call. Good support play for his try. Much more consistent this year.
   2. One of the players who weren’t in the defensive line for the first dry. However, he made plenty of tackles (50+) throughout the game.
10. Junior Paulo (8)
    1. Not as many minutes as he normally plays. No offloads for him today. Not many runs, however, when he did run it was normally great carries for 10m+.
    2. Good defensively
11. Shaun Lane (8)
    1. Dropped the ball twice. First drop lead to a raiders try. Could argue that Paulo’s pass was a bit hard even though it hit Lane on the chest. Could use of his height for Mahoney’s try.
    2. Made a good tackle on Tapine early in the game forcing a knock on. Watching how he has been tackling (around 30+ tackles a game) and generally playing, I really see Lane as a middle now, who can play on the edge if injuries occur. Multiple times while defending, he was lazy to slide and was caught up on decoys.
12. Isaiah Papali’i (9.5)
    1. Fucking left J Papalii on the ground for the first try. Resign the guy long term please. He must keep his starting spot. Such good leg drive and great barnstorming tries.
    2. Defended well. One of the players left on the floor in the second try. But he was the one who made the crucial tackle to stop the line break the play before the try.
13. Nathan Brown (8.5)
    1. Typical work horse performance. I really hope we resign him. Surprised that he put away his passing game a bit today. Especially when he passes to his fellow forwards.
    2. One of the players who weren’t in the defensive line for the first dry.
14. Oregon Kaufusi (6)
    1. Dropped the ball cold. Otherwise, strong runs. Good leg drive and post contact meters.
15. Bryce Cartwright (2)
    1. Limited Minutes. I think Carty will prove a lot of us wrong, but I agree with BA’s decision to only use him when the game was over. His style of game wouldn’t of suited the game being played which was hard direct running.
16. Wiremu Greig (5)
    1. Big Boppa. Looked a bit tired. A lot of potential with leg drive and big frame. Got Paulo to learn off. Should be dynamite in a year or two. Still needs to play more in reserve grade unless injuries happen.
17. Keegan Hipgrave (5)
    1. I like how BA uses him unlike the titans. Plays max 20min and has a simple role of running hard and tackling hard. Does his job. We are undefeated with him in our side lmao.

Coach: Brad Arthur

Interesting use of the bench again. I guess he trusted the boys to play big minutes. I think the criticism on him last week was unwarranted. I thought last week his game plan was correct, however the team never executed his game plan. I love how we played direct and used our power game through the middle. I think during some games BA needs to rest our starting fowards. 

Attack:

Moses

Moses was great today. Happy he proved all the haters wrong after an off game against the dragons. The guy is learning. Excuse him for having a bad game. His long torpedo bombs have to be the best in the NRL. He always lands them just outside the dead ball line to give us field positioning. His running game was excellent especially for Lane’s try. Hope to see this consistently. I am happy when he runs the team and in future D Brown does his role of playing direct, running and defended extremely well.

Direct

We dominated the middle which allowed us to play great footy. We played hard and direct through the middle allowing Moses to run and cause havoc. As BA said, our attack is based on around our power game and not sideline to sideline which is how we played against dragons.

Defense:

1^st try:

The middle were very slow and did not slide which meant Smith had to hold on the decoy runner causing Niukore and Fergo to be up against 3 raiders players. This poor sliding was evident in the first half so clearly BA addressed it during halftime.

2^nd try:

Quick play the balls by the raiders and we had 5 players out of player as 2 players were not square at marker and 3 players were still coming back from the previous play. So we were left exposed in the middle, and Hodgson did what he does best. There was no urgency by any players in the defensive line to close the gap in the middle. 

Overall:

We were beaten a couple of times down Fergo’s edge in the first half. I will be really happy to see D Brown back cause Smith’s defensive decisions were poor at times. You could see Arthur’s frustration from the camera.

What to do next time if D Brown is unavailable?

Looking at BA’s game plan it is clear we play a power game and do not heavily rely on our halves to attack, as such Gutho, Mahoney and Moses provide enough spark. So, if D Brown is unavailable I rather BA picks our second best defending five-eight cause that all we really need. Whether that is Smith or Rankin or someone else.

Referee Decisions:

Some real hopeless calls. Main referee overruling a touch judge who is 2m from the pass.

Us Fans:

I am really disappointed at the lack of trust we had in eels. At least 90% of us tipped Raiders to win in the game day blog. I know it was bad last week, but we need to have faith in our team. Some of the criticisms on Moses were so harsh when he was instrumental in our game against Storm. The guy is learning. Excuse him for having a bad game.

 Team List next Week

Difference