Now this may be a bit of a stretch but hear me out.
Those of you like myself who follow other sports such as Soccer, the NFL and Ice Hockey will know just how important formations are to their corresponding games.
I hadnt really thought about this until really these last few weeks especially when Taka went off injured and Ken Edwards slotted into the number 6 role. When Kenny played the role he wasnt doing too much ball playing, he kicked the ball a few times (unsuccessfully) but ultimately he looked nothing like a number 6 and was playing like he normally does in the forwards. The interesting thing about Kenny against Penrith was even though he was playing at 6 and was playing nothing like a 6, he was still actually playing some good go forward footy. It was quite a fascinating sight the more i started thinking about when watching the game. We essentially were playing an extra forward and had only one person playing the half role for the rest of that game.
It was really something and im surprised it hasnt been picked up by anyone else. I mean BA basically did something that ive never seen before in rugby league and basically changed the formation of starting 13.
Ridiculous as i may sound but could specific formations be the future of our great game within 5,10 or even 20 years from now. I mean there is essentially nothing stopping a team from putting two players behind the line playing fullback at the same time or playing one half and 7 forwards instead of 2 halves and 6 forwards. Really there is no rule against doing these things, the only thing teams have to do is name 21 players on the tuesday.
Creating formations in attack in League is already something that is in our game and it doesnt really get talked about at all... so maybe in the future could we be seeing coaches playing two Fullbacks instead of one ???
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Good to see someone talking football!! It is an interesting notion - gee it would take a courageous coach as they have so much to lose. I also think a different approach to tackling and kicking in general play could bring about major changes to the game but I fear that along with the above we don't have many/any creative thinkers in our game.
It has got to take one major breakthrough in creating formations in RL to create a domino effect. Im not sure if you follow the EPL but at the start of the Year only one team was playing a 3 defender formation (chelsea), but come April, Chelsea had major success with the formation mostly because teams didnt know how to defend against the extra player they had up the middle and were sitting at the top of the league. Now 17/20 EPL teams play 3 defender formations because one team had major success with it.
While yes we dont have many creative thinkers i do think if it ever happens and happens succesfully Rugby League will go through its biggest renaissance period in its young history
There already are different formations. It's just that media heads and pundits rarely discuss it. There was brief mention the other night that DCE attacks outside Blake Green in Manly's shape, but they actually started playing that way the week before, against the Raiders. It's a throwback to the old school halfback/five-eighth formation (though with numbers reversed). Prior to that they were playing the more modern left/right formation.
The Cowboys (at full strength) play a fairly unique formation (though other teams have tried to copy it, including Manly early last year) where Thurston plays in the middle with Coote and Morgan outside him on the left and right, respectively.
Some teams (including Parramatta last year and a couple of games this year) split their halves left and right but attack asymmetrically, working to one side of the field and setting up a long shift to the other side. This makes one side of the attack operate more like a traditional backline (e.g. our left side) while the other side consists of players who tend more to just make hit ups and offloads. The Tigers have played like this since Brooks came back, working left and then shifting right.
There is also the different ways teams can structure their middle third, with some players playing more or less minutes than the others, and big discrepancies in how often they carry the ball.
When Guth is 5:8 we were sort of doing that in attack already.
What I thought may be more likely would be for Guth to replace Semi on the wing (next year or sooner if necessary) and for Guth and Jennings to swap in attack or Guth to wander in as a third playmaker occasionally. Sort of like Semi does now. Quite a few times in attack Semi is inside Jennings.