A lot of 1eyedeels blogs and fan questions have been raised this year, particularly when we lost 4 games in a row. What changed after the first two games and why did we win three in a row prior to the Roosters game. Why did we crash and burn against the Roosters? Well, the Stats answers our questions!
Round 1 vs Manly - We had a high 60% of ball and completed at a high 82% - WON
Round 2 vs Dragons - We had 55% ball and completed at a high 81% - WON
Round 3 vs Titans - We had a low 47% ball and completed at 74% - LOST
Round 4 vs Sharks - We had 51% ball and completed at a very poorly at 64% - LOST
Round 5 vs Raiders - We had 49% ball and completed at 83% - LOST
Round 6 vs Warriors - We had a low 44% ball and completed at 79% - LOST
Round 7 vs Tigers - We had 49% ball and completed at 74% - WON (we had a lot better kicking game and the Tigers were terrible.)
Round 8 vs Penrith - We had 51% ball and completed at 66% - WON (Penrith's completions were even worse and they were crap).
Round 9 vs Cowboys - We had 52% ball and completed at a high 82% - WON
Round 10 vs Roosters - We had very, very low 39% ball and completed at a poor 65% - LOST
Round 11 vs Raiders - We had 53% ball and completed at a high 86% - LOST (we had a very high 45 missed tackles; we gave away more penalties; we gave away too many 7 tackle sets; some poor ref decisions as well didn't help. French's bombed try late in the game hurt.
The moral of the story is for us to be competitive we need the majority of the ball and to complete those sets at a high percentage. Of the games this year we have only lost one (1) game when we had more ball and completed at a high percentage and that was tonight. If our defence was strong tonight we would have won (we missed 13 more tackles then the Raiders. The missed tackles of Hoffman and Semi was poor). Losing Brown after 21 minutes hurt our attack in the middle in a massive way.
Possession is King!
Replies
Thats what happens when youve got poor on field leaders.
From what I heard he does speak with the Referee's bosses frequently, more then any other coach.
Penalties relate to poor discipline.
We lost tonight because our defence was very poor (45 missed tackles from Canberra's 28 sets. Nearly 2 missed tackles per set).
There has been some suggestion from a small minority of eels fans that our lack of wins this year is as a direct result of poor coaching. Well I hope those couple of fans see the above stats because they are telling.
Lack of possession and poor completions relate to poor discipline, poor on field decisions, fatigue and or a lack of ability.
Our losses this year have absolutely nothing to do with BA's coaching and it is only the ill informed that make this bias assumptions.
Possession is King!
Big Dave : What about the wins we have had? All down to BA`s inspired coaching ? You can`t have it both ways.
Good points dave but why are our basics and ball control so bad?
It has to be poor training in that area id reckon because its week after week the same poor basics.
Lack of fitness, lack of ability, lack of structure, too much structure, over confident players, ill discipline and the list goes on. Giving penalties away and poor ball control is not a coaching issue, but a player downfall.
The first thing we need to look at is how strong is our squad and how do we compare to the rest of the comp. Personally, I think we are middle of the road (7th to 10th). We had a lot stronger squad last year and we were a top 5-6 squad last year. Losing Peats, Foran and Jr Paulo hurt us in a massive way, a lot more then fans want to admit to.
We showed tonight late in the first half and early in the second half that when we get a lot of ball and complete high we are very good (we scored 3 tries in a row over a short period of time).
It is easy to blame a coach, but for the most part it is player fault as they don't do what they are taught and instructed to do. I can give you an example: tonight we saw French, Gutherson and Moses run sideways in attack nearly every time they ran the ball (it was poor and hard to watch), BUT I can bet you they were running direct and square at training when they ran their backline drills.
Unfortunately, players go off on a tangent and don't follow coach instructions. Sometimes those players just don't have the form or ability to do the basics under fatigue.
The moral of the story is before you blame the coaching staff look a little closer as it is usually a player fault.
Snake, its not poor training. It really just comes down to lack of player ability. We had a strong team last year with Foran, Peats and Jr Paulo, but losing those 3 players has made us go from a strong team to an average middle of the road team.
I'd love to be a top 4 team, but unfortunately we just don't have the cattle to be one of those teams and no amount of coaching will change this. Even Wayne Bennett couldn't make us into a top 4 team.
You are being glass half empty Robert. Coaches don't win games, players do Robert. We lost tonight because the Raiders had a better attacking team and they scrambled better in defence. Do you think BA had something to do with us missing 45 tackles. Conversely, do you think Ricky Stuart had something to do with Semi and Hoffman missing one on one tackles.
Wayne Bennett showed when he went to Newcastle that coaches are not miracle workers.
Robert, we are an average team, middle of the road. Our effort is always high and we have a dig every game, but we don't have a star studded team and we don't have a big powerful pack that regularly dominates the middle third.
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