Can Melbourne Mauling turn into Bravery in Brisbane? - 1 Eyed Eel Podcast

Unpacking the Melbourne Mauling: Initial Reactions and 2018 Flashbacks Ara ara, Ara. Grand final operating on this week. He's going and Lambeth has got it behind Marsh. Nathan Hind Marsh, he's a Troy score. He freaks No more score. Jonathan one higher super star superhuman that Roger says no way. This is my try. Speaker 2 Hello and welcome to The One Audio Podcast. I'm your host, Elliot joining me this week. I have got Liam back and Phil is joining us from the kickoff this week. So no cameo. Following on from the round one disaster, we're going to pick apart the 52 to four loss to Melbourne before turning our attention to round twos trip up to Brisbane against the Broncos side, who were played off the park themselves by a rampant Penrith to kick things off. Obviously we got hammered in Melbourne, kind of very much to our surprise. We're all sort of along the lines of it'll be a tough game for Parramatta. I think Liam and I both tipped the Parramatta win but that was more from you can't go into round one expecting a loss side of things. But I don't think anyone saw that 52 to 4 coming, unless maybe Phil, because you did mention in your cameo that if Melbourne get on a roll through the middle they will pile on points and that's exactly what happened. Speaker 3 Well, that that's a nice thing to mention. Thank you, Ali. I was going to go there, but look, I didn't think I saw the, you know, the belting, but I did, you know, I was playing devil's advocate and I was worried about their blitz campaign. I also wasn't expecting the referee to to be as one eyed as he was. I mean, we'll go into the ref a bit later. But look, I think I did listen to James Graham actually predict there would be a mop up a similar one to so he was actually one commentator who did see it. Most of us didn't. Most of us were closer. Look, the head was always thinking Storm probably would have won, but the heart was always hoping for eels. Unfortunately, yeah, it yeah, we all know how it ended up. Speaker 2 Yep, 100% there, Liam. We were both very much along the lines of heart Parramatta Head or Melbourne because they are that good in round one, but we were both thinking they were probably not looking like the type of side that they were last year. A lot of changes for them. But at the end of the day we've got a representative spine and three out of four players and and so far long ago slotted straight into the fullback role that he'd shown plenty of promise in and he's now the the full time fullback of Melbourne. They really tore up the middle there, particularly Harry Grant, and he was the deserved men of the match. Liam's Jinx and Phil's Deep Dive into Refereeing Controversy Yeah, well, we actually started pretty well. When we when we scored a try, it actually reminded me so much of 2018. During 2018 when I made a Top 40 year prior, everyone was saying, Oh yeah, now we're going to do top 4 again. We blitzed Pan. If we scores like I think we're up by 12 after like 8 minutes or something like that. Then we got ran down, we got ran down, didn't score another point all day. And then the next week we got done 54 nil. Speaker 2 Manly. That was that hot, like 30 something every day because I was there the two days after I got married with my new wife, who's still married to me. She's lived through all that. But we had someone. Was it? Was it Jared? Speaker 3 2018, guys, please, let's not go there. That has to be it. That has to be taboo. Please, Liam, please. Speaker 2 Sorry, I'm gonna, I'm gonna pull this out. But there wasn't, there was a sin winning or something wasn't there in that match in the first half. Speaker 1 Moses, Moses. It was Moses for descent. Descent. I think. Descent. You talked back to the referee or something? Speaker 2 Yeah, OK. Oh, no, no. Speaker 1 No, no, no, no, no. I thought it was because I remember I was arguing about it was May. Speaker 3 2006, 2026. Speaker 1 He. Speaker 2 Took it off what it's going through I'm. Speaker 1 I'm I'm saying this to the end. I'm saying this to the end. Speaker 3 Liam, you, you jinxed us last week. I, I was, I did listen to the podcast even though I had a cameo. And you did warn us you were going to jinx us. Are you going to jinx us this week again? Speaker 1 Well, no. Well, I did say payment on paper had the better lineup than they did. Speaker 2 Yeah, for the first. Speaker 1 Pipe. But what I didn't Yeah, but what we didn't account for is possibly the second greatest hooker in modern history. And Harry Green covered us up by giving him room. And that comes from lazy market play. But the lazy market play came from on the back of fatigue from the constant six against, you know. And that's the other thing too, is that people are like, oh, you're just saying the ref's bat. You know, I hate blaming the rest when you lose, but it wasn't the main reason we lost. No, I still think we lost even if we got a fair go. But I don't think we get 50 put on us if the referees weren't the way they were. Speaker 2 Phil run the numbers for us on the referee. So I'm going to, I'm going to let him come off the back fence like a like a phooey phooey of 2005. Speaker 3 Don't get me started on the ref because look I my overalls and opposite look, I used to think that coaches use refs as an excuse and I used to think well. Analysing the 6-Again Rule: Stats, Examples, and Systemic Flaws But the more I dug into this game, the more I'm convinced that we had we had next to no chance. Now I I even don't even know where to start. I really need to sit down and lie down on the couch. Do we have a couch here, Elliot? We need to have. Speaker 2 AI mean we are all in our own homes. I do have a couch behind me. He's a recliner. Speaker 3 Do we have a therapist? We we need a psychotherapist. Speaker 2 Maybe I, Steve, start billing the club for for any form of psychotherapy required after watching paramedic. Speaker 1 Games. Well, well, I do have a beer. I do have a beer in my hand. That helps as well. Oh, that'll do. Yeah. So alcohol. Alcohol do. Speaker 3 It let let look up. I try to summarise this cause my article goes into great depth that we wrote an article. I should say we, we'll take, we wrote an article on our site about the stats and we've got the graphs and all that. And if we summarise it, let's just let's go, let's step back a bit 2021 where all these resets started, speed up the game, speed up the game. Now that was that was that was where everything exploded. The six against exploded. We had an average of seven and a little bit per game. Now then it kind of went to the three to five, 3.8 to 5 average per game. Now let's let's Fast forward to last week, OK? So keep that in mind. We've got say 5 to 7. Seven is the maximum that we ever had. The the year before was 4.7. Speaker 2 Is this per team or per game? Speaker 3 Per game. Speaker 2 Per game. OK. So across both teams? Speaker 3 Under 5 per game was kind of where we around, let's say averaged around 5 for the last four years. OK, 7.3 per game so a bit over 7 where we exploded 2021 explosion the Vilandy's universe. We got the we got the game on speed steroids. Now let's Fast forward to last week and I'm just going to try to pull this up because I'm still in recovery. So, OK, now 65 minutes of the game and as you know, you've seen my graphs, the ref through the the restarts our way and some penalties towards the end of each half. OK, so when the scores were 18-4, Storm, he threw sets restarts our way. When the score was 46 four, that was when we started getting a reset and a penalty. So they for 65 minutes of the game, I'll tell you the stats here. We had one restart, they had 9, now 9. That's double the collective average per game. We're talking one team has got double the collective average of both teams for the last four years. That's almost double now at 65 minutes Now we did over 400 tackles now like this is just for start. This is an entree. Now we know it will happen at the beginning in dining camp, you know, I was talking about how disgraceful the ref was. We had you know, they had 4 restarts. Speaker 2 Yeah, I, I just like that start of the game there where, you know, we score first, we put a good set together, we got a good kick down field, we build pressure with our defence. And then out of nowhere, like tackle 4, Melbourne's on their own side of halfway, they're going nowhere and out of the blue, 6 again. And then there's another two and they scored. And it was when, where, what was the six against 4? They were never explained because that's part of the, the, the, the joy of this rule change that should never have been brought in is that you, you don't actually know what it's for. And I, I've got sports ears. I can be at games and you'll hear the ref just go, oh, it's too slow. And then the players will go who was too slow and it's just, it just keeps going right. So they're actually able to address the problem the referees brought up. But not only that is it seems that once the referees get it in their head that one side's too slow in the ruck or once trying to slow it down, they're ignoring that the other team also has the same rules. So a good point was Harry Grant's first try where Stefano is hit, he stays standing in the ruck. Now Parramatta's defenders don't have to keep retreating, the markers don't have to retreat. The referees called helped, but he allows to talk to, to Akumanu to take another, you know, 3 or 4 metres. He splits the markers and the referee instead of telling him to go back on the mark and play the ball, calls the markers offside and that's exactly where Harry Grant runs through. So it's like on one hand he was happy that he was going to give another 6 again. Had had Riley, I think Riley was the, the, the first marker there. Had Riley tried to make a tackle, it would have been 6. Again, had Riley made a tackle, it would have been a penalty. But that's besides the point because Stefano had caused that by walking off the mark and I think we saw that across the weekend as well. I think at one point during that Canberra Manly game on Saturday night, I think Manly had something like 6 restarts in a row at one point. Speaker 1 Yeah, Canberra didn't have the ball for the 1st 11 minutes. The NRL's Rule Change Philosophy and Unintended Consequences Yeah, wait. But let's let it wait. Wait. Everybody's talking about that great comeback from 14 nil down. Now, Manley had four straight resets and and then they got to 14 nil. Surprise, surprise. Yeah, surprise, surprise. Now Gus Gould. Now Gus Gould says you get a few resets and that can change the momentum of the whole game. Now Storm had 9 / 6365 minutes, the biggest, and that's for one team. Now remember 2021 was the explosion. We're talking 7 1/2 collectively. Storm had more than both sides in our explosion. Year of recess over 65 minutes now. Now we'll get back to that. Canberra, sorry. Yeah, Canberra, Manly. Manly had four straight. They got to 14 nil. Now everyone said, oh, they've got ticker. Canberra have got ticker. They came back. Now don't forget they Canberra had the next five straight restart. Five straight. Lo and behold, magically they got back to 1412 and then the game was in seesaw for a while because I don't think there was another restart until later. Manly got one after, but a lot of these games there was a pause in the restarts after half time, which didn't quite happen, and ours was paused around the 50 odd minute. Then they started giving penalties to the Storm, so I think the ref knew that this was getting ugly. The refs. It was a slight pause in the restarts. He started again later, but there was a pause. Then he went to penalties for a while. Speaker 2 Yeah, see, that's just why I completely disagree with the rule in and of itself is that the referees are having an outsized effect on the game through a rule change or a ruling that you don't even know what it's for. Speaker 1 All the time. Well, it takes away the 5050 calls was back in the old days, we all knew that sometimes referees just sort of let a little bit go, a little bit of wrestling like, oh, hand on the ball, you go, OK, let it go a little bit, Bill. Speaker 2 Harrigan's on on record saying that. Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah. And that's the thing. Sometimes you let the game go. Sometimes you let the game, you go. That's not a priority. Where now the six again, you see the tiniest little thing, you go. Yep, on you go. Now people complain, going off to penalty, but at the same time, referees are human. We're all human. You've got to let the game flow a little bit and prior, like if they had the hand on the ball every single time, then you penalise it, repeat. You don't just do it the first time because now they say it the first time they go, Yep, 6 again or the littlest thing off. You're a bit slow off the mark or, you know, getting back to mark and you're not. You've got like a shoelace knot squared. They're going to call you rock infringement anything. And that's the issue. The littlest things that they're calling to make it fast again. And I mentioned this on on a comment on the blog site before. I reckon this is also another thing for the ladies to push his kickoff rule 'cause he's gonna go, well, the six against that lead in all this momentum, the kick off rules gonna change momentum around. So he's gonna lean on this heavily to try and get that kick off a stupid. Can you imagine? Speaker 2 An exhausted team who's just conceded points and they're going to turn her out and go, yeah, we'll, we'll receive the ball and then just get smashed up their own end of the field. The field will just shrink again. That'll either force offloads like we did and end up making mistakes, or they're clearing kicks alone and just make halfway. And the team that's got the run of the possession is just going to set up camp at one end. Like they've got that rule in the NFL and it doesn't stop blowouts. A good team, Yeah, we'll score points. Speaker 1 But that's the thing that he's trying to say is that it's trying to it's a momentum stopper. And he'll argue, well, six again is a current momentum stopper where a Korean momentum can't change it. Well, here's your solution. No, it's not. The solution is get rid of 6 again. Speaker 2 Yeah, I know the NRL has had this problem for a long time of make a rule change. The rule change causes problems that everyone could see coming, and instead of Wheeling back the rule change because someone's got. Speaker 1 Another rule. They add another rule to to help the other rule. Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. Like the whole thing with the with the six against, it's like, well, they got rid of the second referee and then they brought in a rule to focus on the ruck, but that that was the second referee's job. So you could have kept him there and kept things stable and it would have worked itself out. But no, we had to get rid of the second referee on a win. How Fatigue and Errors Contributed to Melbourne's Dominant Blowout But are we surprised? I mean, the fact that Greg Grayman, Graham Isley should have been sacked years ago and he's still in the job. I mean, sorry. Speaker 2 But. Speaker 3 I, I, I, I wanted to get a six again restart because I hadn't finished my rant, OK. Speaker 1 I. Speaker 2 Rant infringement. Speaker 3 I, I still had a lot more to get like now we know the tackle, the tackle count we had did over 400 and they did about 280 odd NRL stats. Now where the score really blew out is say we, I looked at this a bit closer say between because I kept saving the NRL stats every like 5-10 minutes so I could have a look at it later in between about the 46th to the 72nd minute. So say for bulk of the second half they had 17 sets complete to our three now just let that sink in. Now we had we completed about 50% OK through six. They had 17 from 917 sets against three. Now surprise, surprise, this is where our errors blew out now now 150 tackles to 40 in in you know, 30 minutes. So let that see that's ridiculous. How, how the storm didn't put on 70 or 80 points, I'll never know. We're we're lucky that we only got 52.9 US and don't. Speaker 2 Forget the last 14 minutes, we didn't concede a point and at one point with. Speaker 3 12 men with 12. Speaker 2 Men with 12 men you know. Speaker 3 How that happened I have no idea. That was 1. Speaker 1 And we won less and we've another middle rotate playing a lot more minutes to what he should because we didn't have to have already. So he had Paula De Bellon playing a lot more minutes to what they should have had. We have had to have already in the games and then they would have been even more tired. Speaker 3 And the other decisions just made it all worse. So you know, when you stand back and don't forget, we had we had the sin bid, you know, they had a penalty, OK, they got a free interchange, which we didn't get for Ongi with his head high and crusher. So we lost out on and middle to help reinforcement because we brought on Joash. And then there's the ridiculous Captain's Challenge debacle. Now and then we had another scene being late in the game, which, fair enough. I mean, you know. Speaker 2 I'm still like, yeah, but but so many referees just yell out you're on top. Like Stefano was physically on top of him. And I was kind of like, look at that point. They they got the role on anyway. He didn't actually break down the rock. Speaker 3 It's a normal consistency probably these things is consistency and I know you can't. It's almost an illusion. But like how? I mean, look at Hopgood's tackle, look at Stephen Crichton's tackle, look at Hopgood's, look at what happened to Ongi. We didn't even get a new change. No penalty. It was a triple whammy. No penalty, no free to change and you know, and no sin bid, you know, I mean, where's the where's the consistency? So it's not just the restarts, you know, 9 restarts in 65 minutes versus one. That in itself is a killer. Speaker 1 You know. Speaker 2 It also raises the thing we're discussing between the restarts and the penalties. Quite often the restarts are like, I just glazed over by the the commentary. They might pick it up if there's a big difference, But if you had a penalty count of nine, one that would be talked about because it used to be, right, The penalty counts are lopsided. It used to be. Speaker 1 But. Speaker 3 The ref, what the ref does, you see what I'm, I'm looking at the, I'm analysing it in terms of timeframes. I'm talking about the 65. But what the ref did was very clever strategically. He threw all the resets at the back end after Storm built. Yeah, the 18-4 lead. After they built the 46 four lead, he started to bounce. So it was only like 9 four or something like that. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 2 Yeah, but the same thing used to happen with the penalties, right? You'd get some BS. Speaker 1 Penalties at the end of the game. Well, remember Becca balance the. Speaker 3 Ledger, you balance the Ledger, you throw it. But we were so fatigued by that point. Speaker 2 It didn't matter. Speaker 3 And, and you see what's interesting is that for, for 50 minutes of the game, I had, I had a closer look at the, the errors for 50 minutes of the game, we storm and the Eels were 8 errors each apiece. Where the errors blew out was in between the the back half of the first half the and and then in the second half went all the momentum. So we had four errors to zero from the 22nd to 3036 minute back up. So that's 14 minutes. Then we had another 5 errors to 0 between the 55th minute to 71st minute. Now this is that 65 minute zone period that where we're talking 91. We're talking they had the penalty, they won the penalties too. We got the sin bins, we got the bad calls on Ongi, we got the. We backed the bad captain's call. So all those things collectively, basically how, how, how do we stand a chance? How do we stand a chance? Like fatigue is a real thing. We can't like maybe we could have, we could have defended, we could have done better in that game. Like we only came 66 metres in that first half. Now that was that was ridiculous because we needed to get the ball on the other end and we needed a strong kick chase kick to the corners. Don't kick to to you know, that little, little stuff for Longo. But we kicked Amini or Warby could you know, he's it takes his time to kind of yeah, yeah, no, I was surprised when I looked at I was thinking what's going on here? I mean, Moses has got one of the biggest boots in the game, Pezit. We know it can kick, but they almost like lost their their heads under the under the onslaught that because there was an onslaught from the storm and we you know, they were in blitz almost for most of the game. And then the ref was also in blitz mode and we we had no counter. I mean, I was, I, I was, I looked at and I was just, I was, I couldn't believe it. And I, I had friends messaging saying, Oh, I can't watch this match anymore. And I just, it was just a shocker. It was a debacle. Examining the Eels' Old Habits and Moses's Struggles in Melbourne What what was the problem that we had was, is we went to the old parameter way of trying to score in every play. We got desperate instead of setting up sets, getting them in, yeah, putting them in the dead corners, putting them in their own line. We just, we made mistakes again from fatigue, but also we're trying to score in every play. And we started going back to the old fashioned side on the sideline. One play would go to the left, one play would go to the right, we'd go back to the left. We go back to the right instead of trying to play through them and understand that the middles are probably fatigued. So they didn't really have much punching forwards, but Moses was running around like what analogy? I could say chicken with a head cut off. He's going back and forth back and trying to create something as it got haunted by that Joe Chan hit and he went quiet after that. He just he shut up shop. He he didn't know how to get back into the game. That didn't help Moses. And then you had Riley Smith and the Silver who due to their experience aren't used to Moses that they'll lose track of Moses because of his blind shot blind side ships. So they can't really keep up. So and then when you have Melbourne started on the playable and Moses wants to get going, that's where the disconnect is and that's where the Ford passes came from, the bad passes came from, the miscommunication came from and again it was just a big and and look, Panama didn't help themselves. But as Phil proved, the refereeing assisted that heavily. Speaker 3 Yeah, I, I, I think against the Broncos, they're, they're definitely going to come at us high tempo. They're going to try to copy a bit of what the Storm did. But they've got, they've got Reece Walsh now. If Reece Ross is on, we're in big trouble. So we really need to to have a better game plan and we need to use, we need to improve our kicking game because that's what Penrith, you look at Penrith, they took full advantage of that kicking game. We need, we need our boots on this game. Like we can't get pinned and bashed up and bullied and and not make any ground then go sideways, you know, West to East Coast and then we're going to get we're going to make errors again. You know what, this score could be worse. And if the ref goes on his, the way the refs are going with this, you know, I mean, we could see something. We could see something really nasty if you know. Speaker 2 Before we jump straight on to to Brisbane, I did want to say with the, the Melbourne game, I did want to give some credit to Sean Russell because I thought he was our probably our best player out there. They obviously scored our own a try. But I also thought considering he was a bit, he, he spent a lot of his career in on the wing. He shifted to centre last year. He can. He kind of kept having a crack and so did I, I gotta say. Speaker 1 And, and I will say Walker as well, I thought Walker was one of our better forwards of the night. Speaker 3 Yeah, guys, you just reminded me Sean Russell and sorry, see you guys, you have to stop me on my rant. OK, I'll tell you. Look, one of the things I noticed when I started looking at the chronology, the timeline, you know the, you know, when storms start to make errors, when, when the ref threw the resource our way and we got that's when the storms start to make errors. I've told you for 50 minutes the errors were equal. And whenever the whenever the ref threw some our way at the end of the each half, Storm were making errors. So and at the beginning of the game Storm made some errors and we scored. So really, if the ref let the two teams. Speaker 2 They're sort of out between themselves so probably will be a much closer match. Speaker 3 I think it would have been closer. Yeah, I think so. I'm pretty confident with that. Speaker 1 So. So let me get this straight though. Are you saying no six against mean that it's a better game? Oh. Speaker 3 Look, I just. Speaker 1 Brilliant. Look, it's. Speaker 2 It's just, you know. Speaker 1 Why they keep it? Speaker 3 A lot of those games that because our site, you know, a little bit torn, most of us believe the ref was, you know, obviously a bit biassed. But there were some people. I don't blame the ref, you know, blame our performance, which is fair enough. But remember, it's easier to blame the eels, isn't it? Like, oh, it's the eels, you know? Discussing Broader Refereeing Issues and Club Challenges to the NRL I think the the referee across the weekend kind of showed that, you know, it's not just one team cop in it as well. Like as you've said as well Phil, with that Manly camera game was very questionable. We saw the Penrith decision with Tom Jenkins knocking the ball on and that being called backwards, but Brian Kelly's pass backwards was called a knock on. See. See. Speaker 1 See, I found I found more than most, a lot of people were actually like non parameter fans. Even my mates who our first ones are knocked me even went yeah, this is punished with the Lomax. Yeah, even even even they're admitting going. Yeah, something's up. Speaker 2 Here this is This is sending a message. Speaker 1 And, and here's the issue. Animal treats their fans like idiots. They just be put out this product and they'll accept it regardless. We know what's going on. Everyone knew what was going on. Yeah. Speaker 3 I spoke to one of our because we got a few site lawyers and I spoke, I spoke to a friend of mine. Sometimes we're up at 4:00 in the morning talking footy because otherwise our wives are divorced us if we talk to them. But you know, he was he was telling me that Saints were were considering a legal action. And I, I thought to myself and he said he his, his first view when he watched the match. He said, well, we should put an interlocutory injunction on the result. Now imagine Saints and us, we we put in joint legal action and put an interlocutory injunction now on the result. I'm not saying we're going to win, but he would make a point. It would be highly embarrassing as well. Speaker 2 I just. Speaker 3 Want to start start subpoena missiles again, Amy? Speaker 2 Release the Release the subpoenaed Lomax files. Speaker 3 Well, they might get leaked. Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, accidentally. Yeah, I'd like to see those. Speaker 1 All right, but quick. But but quickly. Do we think Saint George would have done that if we didn't do this whole court case? Do you think that a lot of clubs are now? I don't. Speaker 2 Think any clubs? I don't think any clubs going to challenge the result of a match unless it was. Speaker 1 No, no, no, no, no, no. But I mean like. Speaker 3 But am I not? Speaker 1 We could, doesn't. Speaker 3 Mean we're going to win yeah, but make a but I mean get the subpoena them. Speaker 1 No, but I mean have the balls powerless, have the balls to sit down with the NRL and talk about decisions and I think a lot more lower clubs are now getting confidence of backing themselves over what Pam has done with the Lomax situation. Speaker 3 I hope so, but I think our club wouldn't say anything publicly. My suspicion is no because you you saw roles and Moses completely didn't even go there. But I think quietly the club would be very concerned. Speaker 2 I think finally they'd be having a. Speaker 3 A talk with HQ. The club's game. Speaker 2 Does every club does have that discussion with with the NRLS like head of officiating, particularly when it is, you know, when there are issues similar to what we'll raise. I can imagine there they would have been on the phone straight away. So George would have been on the phone straight away during that match or just right after the end of the match. And I imagine Parramatta would have been similar, asking for for clarity around the rulings as well. Speaker 3 The problem is when you're 52. Speaker 2 Four. Yeah. It doesn't help you. You you know if. Speaker 3 If it was, if it was closer like, you know, 42. Speaker 2 There'd be more of a blow up about it I think, you know, if it was a closer match than than getting it, getting 50 put on you. Yeah. But anyway, that's enough about the Melbourne game. I don't want to really live with it anymore. Round 2 Brisbane Preview: Lineup Changes and Addo-Carr's Return Is it enough? Yeah, yeah. That's. Speaker 3 Stop you maybe? Speaker 2 That's enough, Yeah. So let's go into to Brisbane because the NRL in their infinite wisdom have scheduled a guest, scheduled us in back to back games against the grand finalists and the premiers. If you know, they weren't applying the blowtorch before, they are now. So I was just run through our lineup. We've got a couple of changes. Isaiah Yonghi named it fullback again. Bailey Simpson and Josh Atokar returns on the wing. Will Benasini and Sean Russell returns to the centres. Jonah, Pezit, Mitchell Moses are the halves. Moses is the captain. Jack Williams slots in at prop for the suspended Jermaine Hopgood. Riley Smith, Junior Bolo finish out the engine room. In the back row. Kamasui Lungi comes in and starts on Jack Williams's edge with Gideoni Caltona and Jack de Belen. Then on the bench you've got Dylan Walker, Sam to have 80, Matt Dorey, Talon De Silva, Charlie Gaima, Joash Papali and then on the extended reserves we've got Jordan Samrani, Brian Kelly and Luca. Moretti gets named in the NRL squad for the first time this season after he started in the forward pack for Andy Spells Cup side that actually had a win against Melbourne before the slaughter began. So let's start there with the big news for us. Josh Atacar's back two weeks ahead of schedule. I guess what does that mean for for us? And also kind of what does that mean for Brian Kelly as well? He's the first cab to be dropped as soon as the Fox was available. Did we see Kelly getting dropped at the start of the season or simply having Russell picked over him? Speaker 1 Yeah, I saw her. Yeah, I think I, I, I, I think it was more so it was either him or Simonson. And I think Ross prefers Simonson on the wing just to do his carries and a little bit better defensively than what Kelly is. Speaker 3 Yeah, I think Kelly Kelly seems to have a propensity to kind of try to rush up and jam in and and I think I think he's trying to prove something as well. Like I've seen the trials, he's trying to put on a few hits. And yeah, I think that that's the thing, He defensively, we're a bit vulnerable with Kelly at the moment. Now, whether he'll fit into the systems or not, I mean, he's a good cover. You know he's an experienced first grader. Speaker 2 But yeah, I saw some comments from Titans fans kind of going watching him rush up off the wing kind of going, well, that's not a surprise. Unfortunately, we won't get to see him turn out for the East Wales Cup side they have to buy this week. So we're not even going to get a chance to kind of look and see it how he's going to work in the lower grades. But I mean, Josh shadow car for us is is massive. Speaker 1 Well, coming back in early schedule. Speaker 3 Well, it picks it picks it. Speaker 1 Picks is our left side of the fence. He's communication alone fixes our left side of the fence, but also he has energy. I know he's a winner, but he adds that leadership, he adds that energy. He adds that you look like you're a bit down. He'll just say something. Speaker 3 He doesn't stop talking. Speaker 1 Yeah, but he's got that. Yeah. He's got that energy to go in, boys, get going, do this and this and this, and you think, OK, we've got a bit of hope. And also he's got that bit of X Factor numerous times where he'll come along, he'll go behind the attackers and then all of a sudden put A2 kick in. He picks it back up and scores. You know, where the hell did that come from? He's just a speed to. Speaker 3 He's got footy instincts, I think his footy IQ is better than probably what he's been given credit. Speaker 2 For SO, yeah, he's not just the fast guy on edge. Speaker 3 Exactly. And speed, he's still got speed, you know, he, he, he's probably, he's still probably top five, top ten, you know. Speaker 2 He's got this. He's still got that acceleration. Speaker 3 Yeah, still he's. Speaker 1 Still. Oh yeah. Speaker 3 Losing the weights probably helped. Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. The weight that he had at the Bulldogs, he said that himself. He's felt faster and fitter at Parramatta, I guess. Speaker 3 Big, it's a big end because we we did lack a bit of leadership. So we will add that leadership as well for that. Speaker 2 And that overall? Speaker 3 Too. It's just that constant chatter and I think that loss that we had, we're going to need every ounce of leadership to bounce back because it is a. Speaker 2 Yep, 100%. We need that energy to help kind of turn things around. And interestingly, the Fox was also injured at the start of last season when we played Melbourne, which I guess the injury to Moses kind of overshadowed that, but he didn't make his club debut I think until round three against the Bulldogs. Speaker 1 Yeah, but then even then we already know the game plan. They're gonna Ricky Stags, they're gonna target Peasant. Yeah. So it's just having someone went there with the voice and then someone helping Russell in the inside, which he doesn't need help now because he's but he's got help from from Fox. But in that communication of two or three down, he'll be helping Peasant in Katonga as well of when the GM in went to move. Because that's the other thing too, is that if you help the inside people, then the outside men work a lot better. And Josh said that Carl will have that talk of the timing. That's what it is. It's all timing. Yes, timing is confidence. Speaker 3 Centre is more, you know, I think Russell's on the wing, wasn't he for most? Speaker 2 Kelly, remember what he was? Yeah. Speaker 3 Kelly Centre is actually probably defensively. Speaker 1 The hardest position. Speaker 3 It is very tough. It's the hardest and it's critical because the winger then either, you know, has to follow or so if Kelly's always rushing up, so we won't get that same issue. So that will probably help Pez it. But we really need we we really need our kicking game on because we were if we get fatigued like we did against Melbourne and we're we're doing 400 plus tackles and we, you know, they've got 17 sets three. Well, we we're going to be ripped to shreds everywhere. And now don't forget our right edge. It's actually our weaker edge technically, like last year that we were the I think we were the fifth worst and Broncos left edge is actually the fourth worst. So that's an area I wouldn't be surprised if Reynolds or a man they they start targeting our, you know, our right edge because you saw the rooster score two tries there as well on Simpsons wit. So I think that's a that's an area that we've got to shore up as well. I think it's not just the left edge. Speaker 1 To add to your kick chases were to add to the importance of kicking the kick chase from another car as well as another. You know, we forgot about because he chases that kick because of his speed. We didn't have that the other night. So if you have someone pressuring the ball, I'll be like what line Max would did. But instead of going for the ball by timing that defence on the winger, getting that tackle and having no momentum from the run is a killer in those dead corners. So imagine them trying to play out and actually getting past the 10 or 20 metre line by 4th tackle. That's how you suffer Kate. Brisbane because that's the thing that they're not an overly structured team. Assessing the Ford Pack, Tuilagi's Defence, and Bench Depth Options They're more of their flamboyant, they're free flowing type of team. Unlike Melbourne who if you try to go toe to toe structurally they're going to just they're going, they're going to beat you around the rock with Brisbane on wall. Yeah, hospital as a platform, but they're more that flamboyant. They've got to get like like Walsh has. Ralph has to be on the front foot as a lot of players do, but it needs to be on the front foot more so. Speaker 3 Broncos, they, they, they were an outlier last year. Because if you think about it, it's probably since 2006. I think, I think that was it. The Cowboys 2015, they had, I think they had like 5th best defence or, but the Broncos were seventh. They most of the defences have been like top 2, you know, say the last 15 years. Broncos were an outlier, but they won on their talent and they they were brilliant on the day. Walsh was just. Speaker 2 A Yeah, he was electric in the grand final. He. Speaker 3 Was just a wizard. Yeah, absolutely. Saving tries, scoring them, setting them up. He was just, it was a phenomenal problem. They're an outlier that way. They're attacking genius. They're athletic. If they get on a roll, we're in trouble and we've got to make sure we've got to manage the game a lot better than we did. Speaker 2 Walsh is Grant. Walsh is Grant. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 1 That's the thing. If you give him, if you gave Grant space, look what happened. If you give Walsh that timing and space and that momentum, again, that's what Phil saying. Have you given them momentum? Walsh he's got, once he's got the momentum, you can't stop him. Really. He's just that type of player. Speaker 2 And I mean, looking at the the Ford packs, we've obviously got the force change with Jermaine Hopgood being suspended and Jack Williams goes to to prop. I understand why he's put Williams as as a starting prop. Speaker 1 Yeah, he did it. Speaker 3 We did that last year. Speaker 1 Yeah, and he wants that leg spade. Speaker 2 Yeah. But I I feel it does weaken our back roll a bit with coming to a lungi. I don't I haven't seen enough from Kelmar at Parramatta for him to be justified as a starting back roll for us. Attack wise he can be good. There was that match last chance, the Warriors where I think he set up one or two tries. He can be a bit of a a tough guy to handle. He's got a good offload, good, good ball skills. But he does fall away defensively and he can be quite a a guy to target, particularly late in games as he tyres and. Speaker 3 He's going. Speaker 1 To be now he's clumsy. Yeah, yeah, he's. Speaker 3 Also right edge. Speaker 1 But he's but he's, but Elliot, he's clumsy too. He also puts in a couple like sometimes get a bit lazy and you know, put a shoulder in or put an arm in. And I think it's simple. And that makes it even worse. Speaker 2 Yeah, so. Speaker 1 But that's his problem. He's he's very clumsy. Speaker 3 He loves golf. Speaker 1 Though. Speaker 3 Arkansas a junior, isn't he? Speaker 2 I'm not sure. Yeah, I don't. Speaker 3 Or he's based. He's living in Melbourne, I think. Speaker 1 I yeah, yeah, he's a Melbourne junior. Yeah, I'm. Speaker 2 Sorry. Yeah. Yeah, he did spend. He was. Speaker 1 Actually with the tigers thing, with the Tigers and Manly in Parramatta. Speaker 3 Yeah, I I just worry about his defensive, you know, capability. He does. And sometimes you remember that Storm game, the last round one when he was dropped. Speaker 1 He was, yeah. Like. Speaker 3 You, you know, the ball was behind him. He was the closest man to the ball. And then Pappenhausen was about three times the distance. And Pappenhausen grabbed it. And I think they ran away with a try. And I thought to myself that kind of urgency is part of the problem. And so I'm, I'm a bit worried about him on the right edge. I, I think he's going to be a target defensively. Our right edge worries me a bit. Speaker 1 Considering considering Ghana played a lot of games last year, including the win against Brisbane and actually held held himself pretty well and he has that connection a little bit with Moses as well. So I'm a little bit I I understand what Ross is trying to do because too and he can also add a little bit more physicality than what Ghana would because Ghana is just simply first contact down, get the play the ball and move on. He's not going to do much an attack, but defensively that's what Geimer is. Whereas grass is going more to the attacking route with to a lungy because he does have an offload. He runs a good line. So yeah, I'll probably would have preferred gone just just to have that stable edge, but. Speaker 3 I, I, yeah, I don't want Kelma starting. That's me. I mean, look, he might, he might do brilliant. He could even win the match for us. Who knows? But yeah, yeah, I just think his defensive issues are too much to carry, especially from us trying to come back from, from last week. And yeah, I, I, I think Williams would have been better left on, you know, on the edge and then bring in, you know, either Tavati and bring Meridian and then, you know, maybe, maybe Tilangi's on in the 19 just as a backup edge if someone goes down or. Speaker 1 Or even start jury, given that you go go up there to 20 minutes, go hammer and Tong and then all sudden then you start bringing in the Walker and bringing in all these other changes, just like doer and doer thing. I mean, that's what the steady plays anyway, the 2025 minutes have. If you start the game with the 2025, set the tone early with your strong runs, off you go, you've done your job and until Avadi comes on, then Walker comes on and then you start doing and if you want to along, you're on the bench. Put Walker into put Williams into the middle a little bit and put too long for a bit of impact once the game starts slowing down and and and the size. Speaker 3 Also the size. I mean, Williams isn't he's a great player. I'm really a big fan and and Elliot, you remember last when the start of the I really rated Williams a lot of us will want, but he's a great player and the good thing he can play big minutes. He can switch to the edge as well. But I just yeah, both sides. Yeah, I don't know if I'm not I wouldn't necessarily start him, but you know, Ross obviously knows what he's doing and let's let's hope it works out. It's just I'd rather have a bit bit more size to start as well. That's just me, but. Speaker 2 You're coming up against a pack with Payne Haas. You're always going to want a bit more size as so much comes off the back of what Haas does for Brisbane. But like talking of the bench, you've got Sam Toivaidi there as well who didn't get on the field against Melbourne. And I feel like he's one of the, he could be a bit of a trump card for us, provided he can actually get him on the pitch because he showed in the trials he seemed to be back to his his full fitness and his physical size and presence can be really effective when he's out there like he'd he'd probably be. In terms of the NRL squad, I think he's probably our biggest forward given that junior's slimmed down a bit now as Sam's still clocking. And I think at close to 120 kilos in today's game, you don't roll too many big guys, but you kind of want that one big guy who can really force his way downfield. Speaker 3 I think, you know, last week, if that, if only HIA was ruled what it should have been as a as a head of high crusher and we got a free interchange for foul play, I think we would have seen Tibari. Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. I 100% think he was in that rotation. Yeah. When he was fit last year, Ralph trusted him. Speaker 1 Can can I quickly ask you, because in my opinion, I mean what you only want to put what tender go in the first half? Like like if you look at the replay and I know there's no guarantees, but I think we're pretty certain that was going to be a cap too. Do you use if your roles in that situation? Do you still put Joeish on or do you sort of go hold back, maybe put assignments in a fall back for a little bit? Because honestly, I understand you want Joey shattered to do something, but he wasn't going to do much anyway in that 10 minutes and then all of a sudden he was off again. And then you just lose one year middle always. Speaker 2 Yeah, I think the difficulty there with you can put Simonson back is you then lift with one of what, Benasini or Kelly playing on the wing, neither of which they really played much, and then you're trying to squeeze a back roller, which was one of Williams or Cal Tonga. You don't exactly scream like fill in centre. They're not a marauder Nikorai who can slot in there and do a job against the Melbourne side that was starting to pick our edges. Speaker 1 Apart but but then again at the same time for a space of 10 minutes. But Tommy only comes on then you still have that middle rotation. I think in middle rotations, if you can survive that 10 minutes, again, there's no guarantees, but because I have that 10 minutes and he only comes back after half time, you have that rotation with two of our now you're going to change the game. No, but it's all it helps. It helps your mills having a bigger body and giving Junior and Jack the Bellin and Hopcode a little bit more of a braver because you're not partaking as much in that middle. But because they had to stay out there next to 10/15/20 minutes more than what they normally do. That could take quicker. So I, I mean, look, the devil's advocate, but like, and that's fine. Like I just find, look, if Ross had his time again, I reckon he probably would have held silver back and then had Joash go on and then to Avadi would have went on into silver as a casualty. But I just thought I just found that he probably could have waited. Unpacking Coaching Decisions, Player Roles, and Moses's Influence He could have waited until half and then if young is out, yeah, you've only used a free interchange and you waste interchange and populate you on. But it's just a simple change. This is the one change and you don't have to bring him off again. Speaker 3 When did De Silva come on? Did he come on before? Speaker 1 He came on. He came on about two, two. He came about two or three minutes before. Speaker 3 Joash yeah, See that that's that's what happened, you see. And so there's two things there. One, if if that was ruled correctly by the bunker, which he should have been, we would have got a free interchange. We wouldn't have this conversation now. But the other thing is De Silva came on, you know, before that happened. Ongi So that's another circumstantial issue there where you know, he, I, I suspect he, I suspect Joash was always viewed as a, as a replacement for Bongi. Speaker 2 I think so. The fact that he's in the 19 just indicates to me that he's the bright glass full back, yeah. Speaker 1 Yeah, in halves in Rolla, yeah. Speaker 3 Full back winger, maybe 5/8, you know, Or maybe it could have been a swap with only maybe five 80s. Speaker 1 Or or or even if if we do get a point where we lose someone during the game, we couldn't activate an eighth man, He can just sit there in a moment and Ross goes well, tend to go middle's of tiring. Just out you go be that leap man and just make something up. You know, just a bit of extra speedy person around the middle. It'd be like a trade full of the Dolphins. Speaker 2 Yeah, in terms of that, that our our bench makeup as well. You know, we have mentioned Charlie Guimer, but then on the reserves you've got Jordan Samrani and Luca Moretti both sitting there. Obviously Lucas coming back from injury, but Samrani was like player of the the preseason. You know, I, I know a few people have, I think Craig over at the Cumberland throw said Samrani had a bit of a slow start to the preseason, but he kind of got going towards the end of it. But for me, I'm surprised that he's not on that. That 19 probably in Charlie Geimer's spot, because you've got Walker, Tuivaidi and Dori. They cover your middle rotation because Dori Tuivaidi, you got props. Walker covers lock, Geimer covers middle and edge, but you've got Samrani who covers edge, centre wing as well and he adds that bit of extra size like he scored, he scored two tries on the weekend for. Speaker 3 For top gentlemen, where's where's Moretti? Last year I thought he was one of our. Speaker 1 You know, very good middles. Yeah. I haven't replaced him and Jury because here's the thing, him and Jury, Mary and Jury are very similar players. They are just that back fence runner put their bodies on the line with those runs. But The thing is, I feel Moretti's a lot better in defence. I think he's a lot more consistent in his game. Dury still has those lapses. He's a little bit more of a, he's a bit more of a weirder body. We can't really. He's not that agile. Moretti's a lot more agile, better defender, higher motor. They're both sort of interview prone, but I think he's a little bit less injury prone, yeah. Speaker 3 Moretti. Moretti was an outside centre, wasn't he? Outside centre in Union. Speaker 1 Yeah, he's a back role for me. He's back role for Roosters as well. Speaker 3 Yeah, well, I think a couple years ago Waratas wanted him back to play outside centre, so you know, his leg speed. I yeah, I just, I, I've got a big rap on it already. I'm already. I don't know what happened to him because last year I thought this guy was really starting to come of age. Yeah, he's not a. Speaker 1 Spring chicken anymore? No, it's 25 and we extended into 2027. So Rawls had a wrap on him to extending. Well, he did. Speaker 2 He did have an injury at the back end of pre season, which is why we haven't seen him so far this year. But he did start at prop. He started, he started at prop for NSW Cup. So the way I see it, the way that we've started working out lower grades is basically if you're starting at prop or you're starting in that forward packing cup, your next cab off the rank for first grade or you're back from down the door for first. Speaker 1 Grade well, that's Tianka Brown as well. He's starting. He's probably one of the next ones. I've but but but but to to quickly go on what you're saying about with Geimer and Sam Ronnie, as I said last week with samurai, do you think Royals? If let's say, for example, you go with samurai, he's 19 and you have two Avadi Walker and Dury as your middle. So you got the silver as your main plan as a hooker. You haven't got any Edge back rowers in there and say I don't know, Tonga or too along. You go down hurt in the first minute like Donald did. Do you trust Sam Riley playing a full game on the Edge? Well, you kind of have to. You have to. But at the same time, would you trust Guyama more or Sam Riley more? Speaker 2 Yeah, I get what you're saying there. Guy has got the the experience Guy he's played his entire career as a as in the back row and has. Speaker 1 Been in the front and and he's played he's played a few games last year playing 80 minutes on the edge and he handled his own. Yeah. So yeah, that's that. I think that's the 4th process because I understand the sense that because he can play 2nd row and wing. I mean, I mean, look, if you lose a winger, I think no, no problem. Put Sam Ronnie out there. Yeah, no, no problem whatsoever. Just in on the edge back row because he's got limited experience playing. He barely played himself cup. Do you really want to put him there for a full 80 because you've got no one else? Yeah. Like, like if Gamma was on the bench, if Gamma was full time on the bench, you didn't have the silver, for example. You just did the four forwards. Then you could put Sam Ronnie at 19 as that backward as that cover, I think. Speaker 3 The I mean we. Speaker 2 The solution there is, you know, you just eventually boot to Alangi to Mr Thales Cup. Jack Williams slots back into into the back row and then you can be a little bit more creative with your with your bench makeup because you've got Williams who can cover prop as well. Speaker 1 Yeah. Speaker 3 Yeah, at the moment we've got, we've got, I think we've got enough cover at the moment. We've got Williams can slot there, Gaimer and Katagi. Speaker 2 I mean, I'm not talking so much about cover. I'm talking more about, you know, what Samrani showed over the preseason, what he showed for us last year when he filled in in the back line and when he when he played back row. But I also get what Liam's saying in that, you know, he went from kind of filling in at times in the back row. So then what happens if he was asked to play 75 minutes flat out there? That could be a big ask compared to. Speaker 1 Then again, as experience as as Phil said it might, it might mean you might have to put Williams back to the back row. But then again, how does that fit with your rotation etcetera, etcetera. It's, I mean, it can be done. Who? Speaker 3 Who do you trust more? Who do you trust more on the right? Because gone would probably go on the. I'm assuming he'd go on the right edge, right? Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, you're not. That's right. That's right. Speaker 3 Who do? Who do you trust more on the right edge? Do you trust Gaimer more? Do or do you trust Talagi more on the right? Speaker 1 Edge, I trust you guys more Gaimer. Speaker 3 Right, here we go. Yeah. And Gaimer, I, I must admit, when he first was on the edge, I was kind of had a few question Marks and yeah, he kind of warmed into the role. He started to have a few good, he was running some good lines. And also we had the odd offload in him as well. Like I could see a bit of ball playing developed because Delagy's got that advantage, right? He's got the advantage of that offload. He's got really good lines. But defensively and urgency wise, I think Gaimers. Speaker 2 I I think that the, the position the Paramatta is in under Riles, I think the priority always has to be what's your defensive shape and what's it benefited by by the players that you've selected. Because when you have 1/2 back like Mitchell Moses, he's going to make a lot of guys look really good outside him. And if you've got a back rower that can simply run a line hard and pick a gap and break that open, then I think that's the job you're looking for from your back rower. Considering you've also got Ayongi, who's developed himself into a really nice ball player. And then you've also got Dylan Walker, who's probably the best ball playing lock or one of the best ball playing locks in the game, and he can create a gap in the middle of the field for you. Speaker 1 But here's the thing, as I said before, I think Tuolongi adds more in attack than what Ghana does. But at the same same time Ghana played how? Speaker 3 Much more, but how much more? Speaker 1 But it is. But it is where I'm going towards in the sense of he what Gamma did with that connection with Moses was is his first contact. You're going and get the quick playable. And that's what Moses wants. He wants that quick playable to catch, to catch the the mismatch or the three on two or the three on one, whatever it is on that blind side. Because Gomer gets that quick playable with sometimes tooling looks for the offline. He mucks around and get the turn on his back, slows it down a little bit. Yeah. He runs a good line and throws an offline. But Gomer gets that quick contact. Yeah. And quick playable shift to the blind side with Moses, he can do what he needs to. So sometimes, yeah, Yeah, too long. He's a bit more flashy and attack, but Karma does what he needs to do. And the other thing too, is that in Ghana's favour, you know exactly what you're going to get from Ghana. You're going to get high effort, you're going to get high energy and you're going to get someone who just keep, if you tell them to play full, you put time to play 100 minutes, you'll play 100 minutes. We're too long. He has those moments where 5 or 10 minutes spell, he's like, you know, a bit late. Basket basical. Welcome back to the Lion. Hands on hips, you know. Speaker 3 Yeah, he's, yeah. That's the issue I have with Talaghi as well. Great, great lines. Like if everything goes well for him, the whole team is on top. The momentum defensively, they're not under pressure, under fatigue. We don't have Todd Smith and the other guy in the bunker mad. Speaker 2 No, we could. Ashley Klein. Speaker 3 Oh jeez. Setting Expectations for Round 2: Performance Over a Necessary Win Well, let's see what happens. But I'm going to, I'm going to be really watching out for these refs this year. I think we could see some very interesting things going on. But yeah, I I agree with you, Liam, as much as I like to disagree with you, just to be a devil's advocate again, but I do I think we're all on the same page, which is. Speaker 2 I think we got there. Yeah, I know. I think we got there and we started off with a few different ideas. But I'm also a bit of sometimes you've got to just roll the dice, you know, and you, you kind of go. And I get that's probably why Tuolong is on the team, because he does give you a bit of that. Yeah, a bit of that. But I, I would really, really like to see at this stage of the season, Geimer there and Tuulangi being asked to prove himself in Cup in a side. When you look at our Cup side, he's very young and he should be seen as a leader in that side. Like Geimer was captain last week. Yeah. Speaker 1 But but he was. Speaker 3 Smiling it He was smiling at the end of the match last week as well. Speaker 1 But but at the same time, I'm I'm I'm wondering, I'm wondering what's happened because Ross is promoting youth, Geimer's youth and Geimer has shown in first grade last year, he improved out of sight the more games he played. But then he's playing to a lung who is off contract and more likely probably won't be kept. But unless Ralph sees Giman Morris, a million wants to be him to be that. Speaker 2 Well, he was playing. Speaker 1 Ties he's he is Giman going to be the replacement to the balloon in the future because he has a little bit he can, he can he can take the line on and and ball play at the back a little. Speaker 2 Bit guy was playing locked last week for the cup. Speaker 1 That's it, yeah, and as he as he would possess probably his number one position, but he can play on the edge and that's where Ross has played him last year. But is he trying to get him as much game time playing in it and it all to replace the Bella next year? Is is that what Ross's plan is and just keep him lend developing cup because I don't think it's it's worth his. Well, I think he's my first, my first grade. Speaker 2 Yeah, we will see him though back in 1st grade pretty pretty soon. The fact that he's on the bench this week, I wouldn't, it wouldn't surprise me depending how the game is going. If we turn to Geimer for that quick leg speed and that quick play the ball to try and get things rolling for US against Brisbane. And it would just might be that Matt Durie may not get on the field because Geimer is that bit more mobile body. Speaker 1 Or or he probably or Ross feels on that right side. He's starting to get away from his little bit too long. He's fatiguing. Get Gomer out there just for that energy. Just say to him, mate, just tackle. Don't worry about running EE run the ball here from time to time. Just defend and cover Moses just for that. Even if you get to that last 25 minutes, the games of the balance don't let the momentum change just because of that right side with too long and getting fatigued. And then don't worry about Williams who's playing, playing in the middle fatigue him as well and trying to confuse it. Just go on and go out there. Sorry, Matt Drury, you're sitting out tonight or De Silva, whoever rides just doing all right just to get that content because again, he's I found I found I found Gaiman's first contact in the trials a lot better too. He's got a lot more physical as he needed to. Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. I mean, he did bring up a point there too, that it's not a given that talent De Silva has to play every week. And given his performance last week, I'm not sure how much I'd be trusting him on the field because Riley Smith was off. But the thing you always get with Riley is 100% effort in everything he does. And he's he's not going to put that same performance in next. Speaker 1 Week but that but that stupid thing where I forgot who the player was. I know it was Joe Tan or someone like that where the Civil War passed and tapped him of his hip. I thought, what are you doing? Like you that one place up that moment, that moment wandered Melbourne up even more to make him even more angry, trying to get. And that's where the kind of peasant thing happened after that where he got into space. And I thought you're just winding them up when you're down by 14. Like it's not, it's not need. It's not called for. What are you thinking in that moment? Like it was just, I know he's a young kid, but you know better than that. I'm sorry, I don't care if you're 21 or 33 or whatever. You don't do that, especially when you're down by that double digit lead. Speaker 2 Yeah, you're not winding. You're not winding the opposition up. Speaker 1 Particularly. Speaker 2 With Melbourne in Melbourne in round one when you're trailing. Speaker 3 If we keep talking about Melbourne, you're gonna. Speaker 2 I know we're back, we're back on Melbourne, but we should be talking about. Speaker 3 Brisbane but we're not back in 2018, so. Speaker 1 So what's the weather in Melbourne? Elliot, by the way, what do you think it is? What's the weather open? What do you think it is like? Because. Speaker 3 We're oh, it's just fine. I did. I did a check of that. You haven't been reading my blogs theme, obviously nobody does, but I think the weather's around. Is it around 22 to 25° and fine? Like mostly fine. Speaker 2 Yeah, well, this time of year in Brisbane we should be having a pretty open match in. Speaker 1 Terms of it's well apparently it's thunderstorms on Friday on a on a Thursday night I play Thursday night, Thursday, Thursday we avoided it we avoid it we're. Speaker 3 Still, in 2000, we. Speaker 1 Avoid it, Yeah. No, no, I thought it was. I keep thinking it's Friday for some age because I always keep thinking we usually get the Friday night games in this Brisbane, but no Thursday. So we avoid the thunderstorm that's on Friday in Brisbane, so that's good. Yeah, 20. Speaker 2 5° mostly clear, expected to be fine. There you go, Blandy Blog. Speaker 3 Blandy just sorted that out. Yeah, sorted out the weather. Speaker 2 He's he's decreed it to the gods. OK, so to wrap up, what are we, what, what are we looking at for for round two? Phil, you, you kick us off. Speaker 3 Oh look, heart is always going to be wanting the eels. Speaker 1 Yeah. Speaker 3 Look what I want. I'm not expecting a win. OK? If if we win, you, you'll hear me from the other side of the planet, OK? You, you, you'll hear me yell and I will do that Tom Cruise thing, you know, when he stands on the. Speaker 2 Couch. Oh, staying on the couch. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 3 Yeah, I love you. I love you. You'll hear that. I will do. But you see, for me, I just, I'm going to be watching our cohesiveness. I'm, I just want us to bounce back. I want us to, to, to stick, you know, kick chasers. I want, I want to see aggressive kick chasers. You know, I want to see good contact. I want to see, you know, more communication, more cohesiveness when they're, I look, I didn't care if we lose by 10 points, 20 points or two points. I just want to see a better performance. That's what I'm looking for. And I, I definitely want to see an improvement in our kicking game, in our kick chase. I want to, that's the one thing I'm going to be looking at and our line speed, because what happened against Melbourne, I, I did an analysis of the line speed. Melbourne, we're kind of up and down, but kind of balanced throughout the they're around the six, 6 1/2, which is pretty high, right Origin level, like 66 points something. Our, our line speed started phenomenally high and throughout the game it kept dropping, dropping, dropping to about 5 1/2. It kept progressively dropping. So what I'd like to see is better game management from us and I'd like to see a bit, you know, our line speed, better overall line speed, better performances from Riley, just overall I want to see better performances. That's what I'm looking for. The Pressure on Brisbane and the Potential Media Storm for Both Teams What about for you, Liam? Speaker 1 I know you didn't want to talk Brisbane, but I, I will say quickly, they've got more pressure on them than what they than what we do on us because, because ready premiers. I know, I know. But they do, they do, they do, they do, they do. And, and I want to ask you guys quickly if who is going to have the bigger media storm from this game? If a panel loss or a Brisbane loss, we're just going to have more media. Speaker 2 I think for that there's a little bit of a nuance there. For Parramatta, it depends on the size of the loss if they get. Speaker 1 Blown down again, it's going to be a huge. Speaker 2 Media store if they go down in a tight match then it's kind of like, oh, Parramatta's just bouncing up, they're up against the defending premiers, they bounce back against Penrith, blah, blah blah. But if we beat Brisbane, then the whispers are going to get louder about Brisbane's supposed problems like that again, that after winning a premiership, majors suddenly lost the. Speaker 1 Dressing room in. Speaker 2 Three months. Speaker 1 Yeah, again, I said last week, I always tip. I always, always tip Parramatta, but I always you had better being honest. I think Brisbane do win, but at the same time a lot of people, a lot of fans will hate hearing this. I don't think a win is 100% necessary to be get us on the right track, if that makes sense. I don't think we need a win to set to salvage the season of trying to get to the top 8. If, as Phil said, if it's like a 26 to 16 loss, I can cop that. I can cop it if it goes to 40 plus, that's when you start to lie and then it starts to become panic stations again. If if it gets to the point where like 70 minutes go close and then Brisbane score a quick trial to to finish it off, then you go, well, that's just what happens. A better team, one on the end. You've got the energy there at home. That's just what happens. But again and unfortunately it comes down to what, right Wyatt Raymond and Ashley Klein do win the game too because we've seen how much the six against are fluctuated and unfortunately that's the game today where it shouldn't, but that influences the games how they played. Speaker 3 Let's hope some journalists pick up on these resets because there's a lot if if you start looking through every game, there are certain patterns that fall. And it's very like what Gus Gould said is right on the money. You know, a couple of resets can change the momentum of the entire game. And when we, when we getting 9 versus 1 over 65 minutes, which is more than collectively the, the explosion here in 2021, that that's, that's alarming. Like that's, if we get that again on Thursday night, we, we could see another blowout. That's what worries me. I, I, it worries me. It does. It really worries me. Speaker 1 And yeah, and and and and again. And it's against a team that is fast. They're faster, they're faster than Melbourne. Melbourne a lot more clinical, a lot more structured, a lot more precise. Brisbane are faster, the fastest time in a competition and the one of the best they. Speaker 2 Exploit the edges, probably better than Melbourne does. Melbourne goes to the middle through. Speaker 1 Harry and and and quickly too, I reckon as well. Madge will put man on the bench again because what he'll try and do is exploit our fatigued edges by bringing man on. About half an hour. 35 years, I reckon he could he could, he could, but I reckon there's a chance he could go to the bench again and try and exploit him with with the tide middles. He could he he might want to plan a full 18 and he goes to hook away man and get eggs off and then he could start if he starts in to get edit this party out. But but yeah. Speaker 2 I'm not uploading. Speaker 3 Twice standing back, standing back, standing back because actually the Eels have done pretty well for you know, I think they've won what, 7 what is it 7 of the last nine games, including the the preseason preseason challenge. Brisbane have won before this beginning of this year. They they kind of hadn't lost two in a row since June, I think June, July. Speaker 2 The Eels haven't lost two in a row I think since like July or something and Brisbane was like May or something like that. Speaker 3 You've been reading my blog. Speaker 2 You may or may not have read it this morning. Yeah. Speaker 1 I think, oh, here we go, I think, I think. Speaker 3 Since round 17 to round 20. That's so June. July was the last time Eels. Speaker 1 Yeah, we lost three in a row and we beat Brisbane. We beat Brisbane and that's where when Moses came back and then it flipped. Speaker 3 Yes. Speaker 1 And. Speaker 3 Brisbane haven't lost two straights since Round 9 to 13 May because they went through an amazing run. I think it was like 17 from 19 or something before the start of this year or something like that or some ridiculous amount. So both, both teams seem to be on a down eye. I am worried about our confidence and belief. What, how? How much of a hit did we take last week? Speaker 1 Well, well, this is a specific. Speaker 3 Question for me. Speaker 1 But but also, this is a positive of Josh Adakar missing last week because he didn't go through that. So he's coming in pretty much fresh with open eyes. He might lift that morale because he hasn't how they feeling. He doesn't feel because he wasn't a part of it. So that could really help us. Yeah, that, that, that, but that could really help us, you know, and, and the other thing too is that I heard, I don't know how true it was, but I heard someone comment saying that I saw him at the airport getting back all the getting, everyone's getting the bags. But Moses went straight on to the bus to avoid everything. So he was obviously embarrassed. Hopefully he stands up going, I'm sticking to this. I'm I'm going to try and leave because that's what it let's be fair. And it's not fair to put it on him. But he's the hardback, he's the captain. It's all on him if he plays out of his mind, which he's shown he can do at Sun Corp. Speaker 3 3 kicks. Speaker 1 For. Speaker 3 66 minutes, 3 kicks for 66 minutes that that was an issue. Speaker 1 1st. Speaker 3 That's an issue. Speaker 2 I mean, I think we're all expecting a bounce back from Parramatta in in some terms I'm expecting it. I I am not hoping for it if you want to be in the finals, which. Speaker 3 Own. Speaker 2 Jinxes. Speaker 3 We do own jinxes, silly, because. Speaker 2 Right. I think you have to expect, yeah, yeah, but you have to expect a response from an NRL side that takes itself seriously. You know, this isn't and this is, I'm going to drive by here, but we're not the Titans, right? We're not. We're not expecting the down tools in round one, remember? Speaker 3 Losing is contagious. It's a habit. And so is winning. Yeah, that that's like all teams go through these kind of cycles, even even Panthers. Four years of consistency? Well. Speaker 2 Last year they were in real, real trouble. Last year, that's right. And I just scraped, got got themselves together and then scraped into the finals. But they weren't the same they were at the four years previous. But for us, you know, after getting embarrassed like that in Melbourne, particularly given the end to last season, I'm expecting a good performance. It might not be polished. I'm expecting a tough performance though that will, you know, not allow Brisbane to run rough, rough shot. Speaker 3 You see, you saw how rattled we were last week. We were running into each other. Yeah, the game. Everything was falling apart now. We were lucky not to lose my more to be honest. Speaker 1 The the the exact system went out the window because again, as I said before, we're going from side to side, side to side. We weren't playing for the middle. We're trying to scoring a single play. Yes, Yeah, yeah, that's worked. Speaker 3 For us, and that's why we we reverted back to that habit. Speaker 1 Well, well, that's the thing with. Speaker 3 100 percentages. Speaker 1 Under the broad after years, I used to always watch them and I used to always pinpoint the the moment when they were struggling for ideas and I'll falling apart and usually I'll lose those games. Like I remember that W tigers bring that Easter Monday game where Hastings keep that field. I'm sorry because I'm bringing up bad memories again, but that game, that game, I no, no, that game, that game I remembered will go. We were down. We should have been beating them and we're going from side to side and we've lost it here because they lost. They lost the game plan. They didn't go back to the game plan. They just went let's try and go around them all the time. Brought up you say got to go through them in the middle. I think every coach will say beat them through the middle. We've got the pack to do it or I wouldn't say the pack to do it, but we've got the pack to challenge them. We've got the pack to compete. Don't try and go around them because you're going to go around and then you're tying yourself out more. The defence just needs to be a brick, brick wall, That's what you don't need to move. The Eels' 'Schooner of Reality' and Learning from the Melbourne Loss Dean and Kemp raised an issue or question or a point which actually Fox Sport actually copied the other just yesterday. Kemp, look, I haven't got any quote, but he said worse than this effect. He said the Eels look like a team that had been reading and believing their own headlines. Yeah. Speaker 2 I believe that, yeah, I believe that too. There was there was a lot of hype about, you know, you win the the pre season challenge. That means nothing. But you know, particularly for a younger side, and I'm not saying it's, you know, not it can't affect you as an older player, But if it's kind of you go from last you with no expectations to suddenly having some expectations, more teams taking you seriously, then you could start of kind of get ahead of yourself a little bit, start believing your own hype. Speaker 1 And our scoring that early would have won our heads going, yeah, here we go. We we're all right. Speaker 2 And then you get a sight against Melbourne that just go oh, we're playing seriously now, are we? Speaker 3 I got the feeling that we we thought that if we just hung, you know, hang, we hung in there, that things would happen. And then we kind of reverted this sideways play, you know, tapping the ball and we. Speaker 1 Just sort of panicking. Speaker 3 And and then As for fatigue grew, our errors just ballooned out. Yeah, I told you, for most of the game, Storm and Eels, we had the same amount of errors, but it was just some periods of the game when momentum fatigue built up that it when it exploded, that's where the where the errors blew out and that's where the the score just ballooned out as well. Speaker 1 Well, Melbourne went great in the first half. It was just Harry Grant, brilliant. And all of a sudden they just piggybacked on the back of Grant and went, he went, can we, me and I went, yeah, let's go. That's what it was. He created that momentum. Speaker 3 Look, I still got back to those 9 restarts, 9 restarts in 65 minutes. We're talking 400 tackles versus 280. Seventeen sets versus three sets in about what, 30 minutes? Second half. Now they all scream murder. They they, you know this is ridiculous. Speaker 2 Again, you know, kind of as, as Jason Rawls says, needs to have what was it? A schooner of reality? A big schooner. Speaker 1 Of reality. Speaker 2 I've had plenty of those since then. Speaker 1 But in terms of, but in terms of belief in the heart, that comes down to Oswald, our leadership and and coaching as well. Like I don't think we should ever get to that point. I think Rawls could easily tell if they're getting ahead of themselves and that, so hopefully he did that in the bud well. Speaker 2 Nothing brings you down to earth like conceding 50. Speaker 1 In rounds, definitely. Speaker 2 Definitely the boys have had a schooner of reality and hopefully we'll be raring to go on Thursday night when they head up to Brisbane. That's all we have time for this week. We'll be back same time next week so we'll catch you later. Bye for now. Speaker 3 Night, everybody.