Positive Comments:
No injuries.
All other comments:
- After the first minute of the game I immediately knew that no matter how good we try to play that we would not win the game. The corruption was pretty clear. But wow we played awful.
- The sin bin was obviously a horrible decison by the ref
- The captain challenge was another horrible decison by the ref
- The number of 6 agains on 4th and 5th tackle just because Grant asked the ref for it was BS.
- Iongi getting a high tackle and than a crusher but not getting a penalty for it. Than being sent for the HIA was BS too.
- We lost control of the ruck because we would get pinged for a 6 again the moment we held on for a second. What were the eels meant to do. Two different games were beign reffed. Storm are the one team you CANNOT give loads of possession and a quick ruck too. We have zero match fitness since round 1, so that spine, our errors and refs but it impossible to defend under fatigue. We played 60min with 12 men too.
- Now enough complaining about the ref.
- Kelly and Penisni still cant defend 1 on 1 tackles consistently.
- Pezet is overrated. He is not a 6 and looked good at Storm in theri system. He is slow and a poor defender.
- Da Silva is a reserve grader. 1 year into a 4 year contract and I may have already given up on him. His service is putrid. He cannot control a ruck even though he didnt miss a tackle. His decison making is poor.
- Smith had the worst game of his career. Errors, missed tackle, etc. Really hope this was a one off
- Our bench rotation was completely fucked up because of the Iongi HIA. Our bench was a fullback (Papalii), hooker (TDS) and 2 small forward in Doorey and Walker. They had no chance in competing with Storms elite spine and big forward pack once they got a roll on (plus refs help).
No one is saying we played a great game or were not poor with our handing. We hurt oursleves for sure. But apply all the context. Refs fucking over from the start. The bench we had to use cause of the HIA BS. The countless 6 agains. Try to control the ruck and get pinged. Versing the best spine in the comp with all of that is impossible even if we completed well the refs wouldnt let us win I am certain of it.
Replies
Absolutely EA, and the drop of heads was inexcusable. That's the 2024 Eels.
But I feel a lot are underestimating the impact both physically & mentally of having the ruck gifted to a team as good as the Storm.
It's a freight train, and the snowball effect is huge.
Im not excusing anything else of course, and we obviously should be very disappointed with what the Eels dished up.
Perhaps the end of last season & this pre season gave them too much confidence?
I still believe this team makes the 8 and when we play the Storm in Sydney, I think we'll have our answer on how big a difference the ruck makes against a team like Storm.
I reckon Ryles will put his hand up and say he didn't help the boys with the Interchange management today. Made us look much worse than we are. We will still make the 8.
DE BELIN stinks, he doesn't need to play and won't be extended on his club option.
DA SILVA needs to play 80 minutes in NSW Cup week in week out.
JOASH needs to be our back up fullback and nothing else.
PEZET gets another couple games before moving to the bench as back up halfback. I was a big fan of the signing and it didn't work tonight, can't waste many more matches on it.
KELLY should play Reserve grade and I expect him to be once JAC returns.
SIMONSSON best position is Centre, he is too hot headed to play wing.
We desperately need an edge who can come in and do a job for 80 minutes reliably. Williams and Junior are our clear cut best starting props by a country mile, and Sam and T need to play first grade.
Walker needs to play the traditional 14 role as a utility and rolling Lock. No messing about with TDS and Papalii. I hope we are well along the road to resigning Walker.
BARNETT is an absolute must sign to help bring Sam and T through. We should absolutely be sending HOPGOOD to the WARRIORS for him. I think HOPGOOD is an edge, just an overweight undercooked edge. He was signed and a young hard bodied Lock/Edge and moved permanently into the middle and put a lot of tread on his tires. Had up and down seasons and now looks bog average. Sell now whilst we still can.
IONGI is our best player and MITCH is going to be his typical temperamental self. TWIDDLE needs to be on our bench and covering all the backline positions.
IONGI
JAC
RUSSELL
PENISNI
BAILEY
PEZET
MITCHELL
PAULO
SMITH
WILLIAMS
?
KAUTOGA
DOOREY
WALKER
BIG SAM
TEEZA
HOPGOOD (BARNETT)
TWIDDLE
SAMRANI
I am telling you now, do not be surprised to see Pezet as a 14 to start for Brisbane in 2027. Talk is they wanted either Reynolds or Hunt to stay one more year to ease Pezet into the club, Also, now they have Haas money i wonder if they go for a bigger fish? But yeah Lorenzo adds that bit of difference and hope he gets some game time. Twiddle also played well apparently.
I agree with your call for going with one Hooker with a Utility that can fill for 10-15 if needed. Smith wasn't good tonight but that could be and more likely will be a once off.
I am not ready to give up on Hopgood but man time is running out. We have some talent in the middle in lower grades with Tuivaiti, Talagi, Brown, Koina, Polley. But they are all minimum 2-3 years off before making a consistent impact. I think we could see Tuivaiti and Brown be full-time 17 players but Koina and Talagi need more time.
Though Barnett is older, if Paulo and de Belin go in 27' then yeah no brainer.
I would love a bench of
Walker
Tuivaiti
Brown
Guymer
Hopgood isn't too old, he is too shit at footy. Barnett is 10x the player Hopgood is. Cut bait now, T and Sammy are ready. Moretti, Doorey, and Guymer are first graders.
Hopgood trade for Barnett. Lomax trade for Tago. Hopgood JDB and Kelly cannot play first grade anymore.
Did I say he's too old?
Why would Barnett come here ?
Barnett has a 2 year window Parra aren't winning a premiership in that time so again why is Parra a good option for him when in Brisbane he basically walks into a side ready to contend now.
I'd be shocked to see Barnett at Parra shocked I'd even see him at the Dogs before coming to us purely because they are further down the rebuild/retool process.
Worst possible start to the season. I didn't think the first half was that bad and at 18-4 with some very dodgy calls thought if ryles gets into them at half time we could turn it around, thought it was much better than last year when it was 46-0 at half time!
My goodness that second half made up for it, that is the worst half of footy I have seen in a long time, not even in 2018 when we got the spoon did we play that bad. No respect for the footy, no respect for defence I actually don't know what the hell that was. No point talking about any player cause they were all bad but our leaders needed to get them all in and say no bullshit just complete a set and work on our d, we did the opposite every single occasion.
I really don't know how we recover, we have a killer start to the year and can see us being anchored at the bottom of the table for the first month. Everyone needs to have a good hard look at themselves and watch that game very closely
Second half against the Dolphins in 2024 up at Darwin was probably the worst I've seen.
Yep that was poor and the raiders game that same year torn apart that game too.
We got flogged last year in the very same game by 50 points. What did we learn? What did we change? Nothing! Got flogged again by 50. Ryles has a long lomg eay to go. If you dont learn from your mistakes you never improve. Negative 50 is like 3 losses. Useless cunts.
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