Alot of praise can go out to several players yesterday but for me big Sam announced himself yesterday with big minutes and more importantly impactful minutes. When Sam and Luca came on they absolutely shifted the momentum id dare say it was Lucas best game in 1st grade apart from the sin bin.
Obviously Moses and Iongi etc get the praise they deserve but Sam has impressed me since the start but yesterday he was a proper 1st grade player.
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I miss him very much. He was an amazing bloke wasn't he Hector. As tough as nails, could fight like a thrashing machine, huge booming voice and also loved old movies, especially pirate movies. He also loved The Beach Boys and had an incredible range of other musical interests. We chatted every day about bullshit, which was great. He had another O'Reilly story he told me. He played against The Bear when Bob made his A Grade debut at the age of 16 I think. I asked him how Bob went against much older blokes and he grizzled back "he went OK". He had a statue of The Maltese Falcon next to his television (you would need to be a certain vintage to know what that is). The week before he left us, he told me he was going to give it to me next time I visited him as he thought he may be on the way out. I told him he was a stupid old bastard and he had many years ahead. He could have written a book with all the stories he had
I think Junior Paulo is the closest thing we have seen to The Bear. Sam reminds me of a cross between Ron Hilditch and Brian Hambly.
That match would leave a "hell of a set of footprints" Tragic.
Speaking of which I remember the story of Brian Hambly running over Keith Barnes in the mud at Leichardt Oval. The word was that Chalky Barnes had a set of Hambly's prints over his jumper and across his face. Give old Chalky his due, he did bring him down.....and old Grumpy Hambly just grimaced.
I think Sam and Luca both outplayed our bigger name starting props, the energy and enthusiasm along with their leg speed changed momentum whereas you sub props usually drop off from your starting ours had the opposite effect on Monday. If junior could replicate his from from the dragons game (which I doubt it was a rarity) and these two keep improving it will be a great combination. Like others have mentioned we need more out of hopgood (and obviously our edges), he still tries his heart out but to me he looks too heavy and slow, not sure what has happened to him
That back injury from last season has ruined him! He's been playing poor since he got back 😞
I don't think he is playing poor PP as much as not meeting his previous high standards.
Using the word "ruined" is pretty subjective, lets be patient, I do believe that Hopgood has taken on too large a workload in lieu of the quality we have demonstrated from the beginning of the season.
Lets hope we see the old one again in the near future.
There using Tuivaiti in the correct manner he isn't a starting prop yet that's what there using Paulo and Williams for the initial beat up then bringing Moretti & Tuivaiti on after them once the game loosens up then you see the mentioneds effectiveness against in most cases bench fowards.
The real positive I saw whenever Tuivaiti met May in the physicality stakes Sam was more than a match which is seriously a positive sign for him moving foward against one of the form middles in the comp.
Yes Coryn there is a balance at this stage for a guy like this kid. We saw how an injury can cause a loss of fitness in someone like Greig and him never being able to return effectively. This can happen with big men....retaining his fitness, staying relatively injury free and then balancing him into the needs of the side, makes an interesting challenge for Ryles.
When has Greig ever been fit popo. In his 4 years at the club, maybe he's had 3 or 4 decent games, but he's had enough opportunities to get fit enough. You can't blame an injury on his performances. He's had more than enough off seasons to get his fitness right.
The bottom line is, Brad should have seen the early signs of his fitness issues and cut him loose. Many fans saw the signs very early on
Oh Chiefy! surely you saw the point i was trying to make relative to a big man. I dont disagree with anything you have said about Greig.
Just constantly disappointed how you see things but don't understand. Really the story of your life isn't it Chiefy.
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