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Interestingly on the same page of the tele there was a comment about Andrew Fifita getting a role at the Sharks. No mention there by Rothfeild that the NRL should investigate...

Can the same comparison be done for our defence under the two coaches?

I get the feeling Jackson thinks Barret was OK, the change is nothing to do with Potter. In the presser when asked about what has changed, Potter says at the 0:30 second mark: Potter: “The players themselves I think have realised there is more in them and they want to play a little bit more and...

I went today and the atmosphere and crowd were fantastic. It's a pity that the team performs so badly for its fans - I fear we will lose a generation of young supporters if we haven't lost them already.

Agree, there was no hunger - he just stood there and watched the ball bounce without making any attempt to grab it.

I used to think the way the media portrays the bulldogs was somehow related to the super league war, but now I think it's just a sports thing. Look at wrestling which is all about plots and stories, where wrestlers are either faces or heels. What happens between fights is just as important as...

It is hypocrisy to accuse the current board of having no vision, when those calling for an EGM have not presented any vision themselves.

Has "imminent" replaced "on the verge"?

The coaching at Manly takes secondary importance to Tommy Turbo's health - there in a huge difference in the win loss ratio when he is playing or not. Manly have lost every game since his last injury.

I agree, the "young guys" and "it's another learning curve for them" lines have been used for the least 3 years. At what point do they stop being "young guys"?

I recall that Warren Ryan did something like this with Steve Mortimer?

Why does the OP think that Holbrook is some kind of saviour? He is untested at NRL level. If the board signed him and he failed to make the team work, no doubt everyone would be calling the board incompetent for signing an experienced NRL coach instead.

Yes, any member can get in if you have your card on you.

I was in the bar but left after the game. There weren't many fans there when I left, maybe less than 15?

I think Meaney submits to a tackle so he doesn't get manhandled over the sideline or back in goal

Agree! The first major shock was the good Friday game a couple of years earlier, but that cowboys game was atrocious.

Isn't the captain included in press conferences anymore?

Klemmer reminds me of Trent Barret. Both played average in club games, but really lifted in rep games like state of origin.

I'm not sure that's a valid argument, the average crowd attendance in the NRL so far is just over 15,000 https://afltables.com/rl/crowds/summary.html . Only the blockbuster type games seem to crack 20,000+ fans, and finals should be played at larger venues.

Why is 25k the magic number for a stadium? What would be wrong with say 15k capacity? Who cares if not everyone can get a seat. Basketball is played in small stadiums in the US and has expotentially more fans than any sport in Australia.

This is all symptomatic of rugby league dying a slow death. The game is leaking fans to the soccer juggernaut. The easiest answer is transfer fees that also count to the cap of the buying club - that would sort out this nonsense straight away.

I find it interesting that the incident occurred in May, but the story breaks in the finals. The timing seems like a deliberate attempt to sabotage a team in the finals facing a must win game...

The charge was always going to happen. The NRL needs Brisbane in the top 4 for tv ratings and increased betting, so it makes sense to weaken teams opposing the broncs.

One of the positives of a 1 year deal is that it cannot be back-ended... :)

Johns going on about Klemmer to Newcastle is disgraceful. Its a game between the dogs & parra, why is channel 9 allowing this crap.

It looks like he is testing the market. Who would have organised the TPA that apparently fell through?

What I find disturbing with this story is someone at NRL HQ must be leaking info. It sounds like a board member made a discreet enquiry about the process, and somehow it ends up in the media's hands.....

Really sad news. I used to go to his gym at Punchbowl many years ago, still remember him at the reception desk, always available to talk. A very sad day.

There seems to be a small group of posters who are really bitter over Dib getting ejected, and they will attack anything that any new board member says or does. This is just another example.

Why do we need to change the jersey design every year? Is the merchandise revenue that great? If the club was serious about rebuilding its culture, it should go back to the 80's jersey design, rather than the strange ones they've come up with.

Might take a long time to confirm the signing, as we know, a "verge" can mean up to 9 months.

Is there any valid reason calendars need to be prepared so early?

That's what I thought when a read the story, this is an attempt to drive a wedge between the two, with one ending up at the Roosters,

I wonder if anything can be read into the words "It’s clear to me that the Dragons are Paul McGregor’s team". Does this mean that the Dragons players have bought into the coaches message, whereas the Bulldogs players have not?

There is no way I am a better judge. Something has clearly gone wrong....

Too many posts to respond to, but I am not a Hasler apologist. I'm just trying to find the positives if we have the same coach for next year - if he was going to leave, you would think it would have happened by now, as it has at other clubs. When you look at games from 2014 and before, the team...

After reading the following article http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/blog/2017/02/28/why-do-we-sack-coaches It seems there are two ways to go when a team falls into a rut (1) sack the coach, or (2) get rid of players and change the senior playing group. The easiest & cheapest way out is to blame...

One of the great unknowns would be that if the team had played this way from round 1 with a running hooker, would other coaches have worked out how to counter it after a few games (i.e. such as the initial success with Frawley).

If true, that the backended contracts all hit at the same time would be complete and gross incompetence by those who run the club.

In 2012, didn't we use a wrap around tactic in attack that caused a change to the obstruction rule, as the media kept complaining about it?

I think the phenomena with Frawley, Cook etc is that when a player is new, they have a good impact as opposition teams have trained against a different structure. After a few weeks, opposition coaches will have adjusted their tactics. At this point is where the "new" player has to prove their...

Didn't Eastwood also spill the ball in the 1st half?

If anything, I think this makes Doyle look really bad. What CEO from another club in future will trust him when he blatantly reveals "in confidence" texts sent to him from another CEO.

Maybe it is better looking for similarities - at both clubs, there was no renewal within the playing group, the existing players just aged.

“It’s been one of the hottest pre-seasons that I have been a part of. The boys have had some gruelling training sessions" Hasn't this been said EVERY pre-season for the last 30 or so pre-seasons?

Yes! In addition to all the points the OP raises, it is the boring, inane style of play that really lowers the bar. I hope next year that there will be some excitement to the teams play. I get the feeling that the fan base has a peaked, and it is downhill from here.

Too many acronyms can be made from that name...

Maybe Foran is on the verge of signing?

Not sure what everyone else thinks, but in the first half, without about 2 minutes left, dogs are in front by 12-6. They are attacking the line about 20m out. I don't remember the exact details, but there was some sort of nothing kick, parra got the ball back and eventually scored a try, going...

I don't think comparisons with prior years can make this year look any better. In prior years there were other factors contributing to poor starts such as injuries and suspensions - wasn't there one year where graham was out for most of the starting games? This year we have had a fairly stable...

I do realise this, I'm just saying the writing was on the wall in the loss to the warriors. Tonight's game just confirms it.

I don't know why everyone sees tonight's result at the "final straw". The loss against the warriors was the real indication about how bad the team is going.

How long is left on the coaches' contract? I thought 2017 is the last year?

This is all too confusing for me. Moses signing has advanced from being an on the verge of signing, to being an imminent signing, and now to he could still walk away? What is happening?

As a game, Monopoly is bad - they would have been better off developing a rugby league board game instead. Monopoly seems to rebadge itself to anyone willing to pay a licence fee, there seem to be rethemes of everything, but it is still the same game. Having "in jokes" would have made it...

He is on the verge of being great.

This is why a club can't be "punished" with a loss of points for crowd behaviour, it opens up this type of possibility of people trying to sink another club's chances.

Combine running on the 5th with kicking to wingers, it takes the impact of the opposing fullbacks out of the equation. I think one of the ch: 9 commentators (Ray Warren?) said this in the game against Parramatta.

I also think the run of close games will be over, both weekend games will probably be lopsided.

There is also a tie in with Des Hasler - wins premiership in 2008, 3 years later, wins premiership in 2011, 3 years later is 2014...... The numbers are starting to come together.

This might sound like a dumb question, but is Lichaa actually coming to the dogs in 2015? Has it been officially announced anywhere?

Maybe the media is just being positive in the lead up to origin I, and the same old negative rubbish starts afterwards. But it would be good if the media was always this positive and actually helped promote the game.

Sydney newspaper story writers (I can't use the term journalists) are too intent on negative stories on our own teams and rugby league in general. Trying to actually promote NSW over Qld is beyond their capacity.

If we have to put up with a delayed telecast, couldn't ch 9 do a lot more with it, that you could not do in a live coverage? For instance, why couldn't they leave more time at the end to show press conferences or better interviews? These would have been held by the time the games airs.

This is a major blight on the game. It is even worse when you consider channel 9 broadcasts in lower quality standard definition, making most modern TV screens a waste of money. I remember of few years ago ch9 was going to broadcast SOO in 3D, but never happened

This is where Josh Reynolds energy was so good in the second helf, with his one on one strip and intercept try. He just never gives up regardless of the scoreline.

Ennis isn't mentioned on the report?

I could never understand how the curved kicking became so popular. It is great when kicking from the half of the field where it curves into the posts reducing the angle, but from he other half the angle worsened. Straight kicking is the same from either side of the posts.

Spot on he is turning himself into someone no other club would touch. Who would ever risk agreeing to an MOU with him in future?

The most significant thing in the story is that the NRL is washing it hands of it when David Smith said it's "a matter for the club and the player and the player manager." So the media is now clamouring for it to go to court... Unfortunately it looks like the Australian sports media is slave to...

The media is probably trying to twist it into yet another anti-Bulldogs story.