With many Eels fans saying our season was dead and BA should be shown the door normal service resumed today. Against an understrength Knights side the Eels were clinical and solid in attack and defence. Forward dominance and offloads were back and the backs chimed in with some classy tries. Our spine look like a winner again and BA looked like he knew what he was doing. A few defensive decisions were still questionable on the edge but not chronic.
So will the real Eels please stand up? Is it the Eels of our previous 2 games or is it the Eels who have been highly consistent this year and have looked capable at challenging for the title?
Stay tuned for next weeks exciting of edition of "Who are the real Eels'? The jury will no doubt be out until Grand Final day. But for now the critics have been kept at bay for another week.
Replies
Hard to gauge a form line based on that game. Newcastle had way too many players missing. It was good to get some passes to stick and find the tryline.
Edges still look dodgy to me which is only going to be a concern when we play the top sides.
Waqa played like he'd been giving a big rev up. I forgot how good a runner he can be.
We played with a bit more variety in our own half which was good to see. Some forwards passing to each other and some early shifts.
Again it's the edges we need to see fixed. We still jam in 100% of the time instead of jamming when needed or sliding when appropriate. If Knights reserve grade could get around us the Panthers will lap us. Still some work to be done.
Probably good it's happened now. As sterlo said "It's fixable" and its more decision making and communication than it is just guys cant tackle.
My concern is that BA seems to not be prepared to acknowledge that jamming in isn't always the best way. In fact, it's only the best way when you make the stop, too often we don't. BA is depending heavily, actually entirely on our middles working from the inside. But you need to be able to hold & slide when your middles get dominated, which is going to happen from time to time.
exactly. When are middle lose the ruck, our edge's don't know how to defend.
The Knights were nothing short of woeful today, hardly anything to get excited about.
We beat Melbourne on a wet night, beat a severely depleted Roosters and beat Canberra who clearly have massive issues.
We were outplayed by the Dragons at our own style, convincingly beaten by Manly and had no answers for South's.
If anything at this stage I'm yet to say I'm convinced that we have improved from last season.
We play Penrith in a few weeks time, hopefully it's on a dry track and both teams are near full strength so we can get a true guide as to where this team is really at.
Scott
Sounds like you have made up your mind Scott.
NZ, there is no doubt we are a good side, we have proven this every year for the last few, but how good are we really?
We need to turn this season into one where we go deep into the finals or it will just be another carbon copy like the last few.
Scott
I think we can Scott. I mean I think we can but I am confused - Who are we? the team from the last 2 weeks are no where near a deap into the finals team but for the rest of the season - yep we've looked alongside Melbourne as the only team who can challenge the Panthers.
All true, but gees enjoy the fact we are sitting where we are on the ladder and have won alot more than lost. Still a long way to go and lots of things can happen.
True. 80% of the season has been fantastic. less than 20% was diabolical. Thats why I think we arnt done yet.
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