I rewatched the trial game again last night, mostly watching off the ball, and it was “just a trial game” and nothing more. I didn’t see anything great or anything terrible. Many of our best players missing and others playing out of position, played one half and/or rotated, with the obvious result, not a lot of cohesion. No one really stood out, either good or bad. In general longer they were on the field the better the majority of them played, which is kinda the objective of trials.
I made the mistake of reading comments on here before the rewatching and as result I expected to see things that I actually didn’t see. For example, from some of the comments I expected to see a lift in the performance driven by Wakeham in the halves, not really. What the noticeable difference was the support players were there, with spacing and positioning so he had someone in a better position to pass to. Of the 3 kicks that I paid attention to one was a ripper, one he was lucky that it was caught otherwise it was going out on the full and the third (unluckily) went DiG and gave them a 7 tackle set. Speaking of halves, I’m not a fan of playing Cogger, in defence in the 20, between Harper and Okunbor, they both know he needs help against larger and highly mobile centres and they compress around him leaving the wing exposed. He needs to play at least one more in and if he can’t defend there then he shouldn’t be selected.
I thought Katoa went OK, much like I have seen him play for Penrith. But I didn’t notice much of a drop off in service when Holland stepped into dummy half. I was surprised at that, I expected worse.
For the second trial I’d hope to see more cohesion, with the majors playing (yes, I understand the injury risks). With better positioning and spacing (especially in defence) from the very kick off. A backline with depth, multiple players in motion, a step up in intensity and more of the “team look” than individuals trying to impress, with their own prowess.
Go Dogs