Opinion 7 years of GroundHog Day So Far ..

[belmore_utd]

We need to clone Ogre...

I can't wait until Shrek JNR is 10 years old to start seeing us fold some Kent's again. Just bring Evans in so he can Kamikaze himself into the Roosters after the bye

 

[lovemachine]

I can't wait until Shrek JNR is 10 years old to start seeing us fold some Kent's again. Just bring Evans in so he can Kamikaze himself into the Roosters after the bye

Cuz what?
Shriek has a 24/25 yr old son you realise.
Older than Matt Burton

 

[Bulldog1966]

Well at least I know who Kane Evans is now.
Doughy looking prick

 

[wendog33]

Kane Evans no way.

 

[chihuahua dog]

Dirty cheap shot merchant.

Plus how shit are you when even the ESL don't want you...

You'd have to ask Dylan Napa...

 

[belmore_utd]

Cuz what?
Shriek has a 24/25 yr old son you realise.
Older than Matt Burton

Talking about clones uleh, not talking about when cousins marry cousins. That's how we ended up with Nasheed

 

[Hounddub]

There's lots of valid analysis here but honestly it overlooks the most significant issue which has plagued the Dogs for the last 7 years. We have zero teamwork/cohesion in our team.

Just this year alone we've had 4 different halves pairings, a giant injury list and I doubt we've had the same team on the field twice. This mean a lot and is a trend replicated for years.

All this banter about new players, new selections and constantly trying to win through acquisition of solutions is insanity.

The OP made some good points, but the most important one was that the Panthers have played together since 15yo. This is the teamwork index and in my opinion is the biggest issue at the Bulldogs.

Just let CC settle on a team, and let them play together. Currently they're 13 strangers on the field.

 

[BlackDawg]

No bro, it was a shit post
I cant be any more honest.
He thinks that the key to our success is to get giant forwards bending the line.

This isnt 2010.

Please listen because im sick of repeating myself.


It ignores two waves of important rule chan2 players to 8.

2017- The reduction of interchange from 12 players to 8. This was the first step in ensuring players were fitter and more agile.

2021- The 6 again rule.

This cemented the emergence of small nimble forwards in place of hulky big players. Overnight, stars like Shannon Boyd became obsolete.

Why are we even arguing here? Souths are the berst team in the league by far and have the smalest pack. Penrith werent that big either.

Harami OP is stuck in the 80's. He even says 'the dogs will always be about a big pack' which is him living in the past.

Yet we have Paulo, Haas, Horsborough & many other big forwards who play 60 minutes a game. You can still find big forwards who can play big minutes in this game and then you can also find smaller mobile forwards like Murray who run through brick walls for 80 minutes. The secret is recruitment. We buy peahearts like TPJ & impotent forwards like Thompson on big coin who cant play minutes, cant get any post contact metres & dont really give a shit about our club or whether we win.

 

[wendog33]

There's lots of valid analysis here but honestly it overlooks the most significant issue which has plagued the Dogs for the last 7 years. We have zero teamwork/cohesion in our team.

Just this year alone we've had 4 different halves pairings, a giant injury list and I doubt we've had the same team on the field twice. This mean a lot and is a trend replicated for years.

All this banter about new players, new selections and constantly trying to win through acquisition of solutions is insanity.

The OP made some good points, but the most important one was that the Panthers have played together since 15yo. This is the teamwork index and in my opinion is the biggest issue at the Bulldogs.

Just let CC settle on a team, and let them play together. Currently they're 13 strangers on the field.

Where do Phins fit in a scenario like that?

 

[Hounddub]

Where do Phins fit in a scenario like that?

I think the Dolphins recruitment strategy was built around buying as much experience as possible. Between Bromwich/ Bromwich/ Nichols/ Aitken/JMK/ Wallace/ Kaufusi they bought nearly 1500 NRL games of experience. Most of that between three leaders in the pack who've played together for years.

I doubt whether the entire Bulldogs 17 have 800 games experience between them and one of the reason why we lack the leadership and experience on field.

 

[enoughsaid]

Dirty cheap shot merchant.

Plus how shit are you when even the ESL don't want you...

ESL didn't want Reynolds
And it's proved a disaster for us

 

[The DoggFather]

ESL didn't want Reynolds
And it's proved a disaster for us

Exactly right.

ESL = our reserve grade

 

[billy beane]

We’ve all heard this before, forwards win you the game, your backs determine by how much.

They can change rules, they can continue to try and make the game faster, they can do whatever they like with the game, but that old quote still stands true today, and so it will tomorrow.

Rugby League is a very straight forward game, the team that over powers their opponent and eats up the metres, is at the same time fatiguing their opponent, you out muscle & fatigued your opponent, they make mistakes, they get sloppy, they draw penalties, penalties put your opponent on the back foot and you fatigue them even more, obviously, your whole job just continues to get easier.

Who’s the most penalised team in the league right now? … yes you can blame ref’s, you can scream bias ect. but realistically, most of those penalties you can put down to fatigue and stupidity.

I’ve seen fans on TK blaming our losses on Ciraldo, Burton, Flanagan, Mahoney, Perham, I’ve seen comments saying Oloapu doesn’t have what it takes, the poor kids only 18 and played 3 games.

Individually it’s none of those players fault that we lose, these players can’t fully utilise their skills while we’re going backwards, and when they do get their chances they’re generally fatigued ….. we lose because we don’t have a squad that’s capable of over powering most of our opponents, we haven’t since we lost Klemmer James Graham and Co. we don’t over power, we get over powered.

I’m over hearing about the “these days you need more of a mobile pack” that’s not what the Bulldogs are about, it’s not what we’ve ever been about.

Go watch the games again where we lost to the Raiders, Warriors x 2, Sharks, Parra, Rabbits, Manly, we simply struggled to stop them going forward and put them to ground, these teams simply out powered us and in doing so they fatigued us, over power and fatigue your opponent, complete the majority of your sets, and 8 times out of 10 you’ll win the game.

One team in the league suits a mobile pack and that’s the Panthers because they’ve all played together since they were 14, that whole team trusts each other and can all ball play promoting the ball to tire teams out.

If the plan is to develop the “mobile pack” get used to losing, because we’re not good enough for that type of play, and meanwhile our opponents are all focused on building powerful packs.

We are not going to win games or play finals footy until we totally rebuild our engine room, honestly, right now, Max King is the only one I’d keep, some others might make bench or depth.

We do have the makings of a good team and despite what people think, we do have a smart talented coach.

I’m now hoping against odds that we snag Hunt, we need leadership, after 300 first grade games, reps and origin, he’d be very good for us & I think we might be very good for him to finish his career with.

This might be controversial but I feel we need 2 new centres, 2 aggressive powerful centres that can tackle, run, make metres, and break tackles. Personally, I don’t feel either Alamoti or Averillo are powerful enough right now to be modern day centres, (think Ramien - Talakai) whilst Al & Avo hold their own, they get dominated in defence by stronger more powerful body’s and therefore fatigue. Not sure Xerri’s that type of centre either but we’ll find out and hopefully he is ..

We have 2 powerful metre eating outside backs, we have 2 very good wingers, a good 9, we have Burton, Crichtons a ? the squad desperately needs a game managing 7, 3 big aggressive metre eating props, and 2 aggressive defensive tackle busting centres to back them up, we don’t need elite big money players, just aggressive powerful metre eaters that hurt, until we get them nothings changing and not even Cleary would have us winning games ..

The 2 biggest things we’re missing is “power and aggression” get that and we become a fearful pack again, until we get it we’re not going to be winning games and we certainly won’t be playing finals footy.

So continue to individually blame players as much as you like, but power mongrel and aggression is where the real blame lays ..

Another quality post mate .... i have always said i can handle being beaten by a more skillful side but i LOATH being outmuscled.

You must have been a big fan of Warren Ryan and The Dogs Of War era.

Wish i could write half as good as you.

 

[TwinTurbo]

I knew a few would feel I was a bit harsh on our centres, and I get it, but my comments come from the situation we find ourselves in at the moment more than who they are as players, if we were top 4 and killing the opposition we could bring a non seasoned 19 year old Alamoti into the side and cover for him till he gains the experience and power that’s needed, but we’re not in that situation, we need powerful centres to help us out muscle our opposition right now, because we’re being horribly out powered, and the 2 we have aren’t yet suited to that powerful style of footy yet, and I’m to impatient to wait another 2 or 3 years until they are.

That's a chicken and egg argument. We don't have enough "cover" and there's not a lot available right now of any quality. So we have no choice but to promote players into the team without "cover" and that includes centres.

If we followed your argument Preston would never have been given a go this year, or King last year.

As for "outpowering" JAC doesn't out power anyone he simply out speeds them, ditto Averillo, and hopefully Xerri will do the same next year.


Always a Bulldog

 

[Taylforth]

That's a chicken and egg argument. We don't have enough "cover" and there's not a lot available right now of any quality. So we have no choice but to promote players into the team without "cover" and that includes centres.

If we followed your argument Preston would never have been given a go this year, or King last year.

As for "outpowering" JAC doesn't out power anyone he simply out speeds them, ditto Averillo, and hopefully Xerri will do the same next year.


Always a Bulldog

Yep pretty much agree with most of the original post. You make good counter-points about Preston and King. Injuries have not helped but I think a quality HB & the forwards is where Gus needs to focus most effort for 2024/25.
This also supports the point I was trying to make about our defence/roster & playing style (to suit new rules) a few weeks back, when everyone was trying to blame the refs for most of our misfortunes. We don’t seem to get many 50/50 calls, but that is because we are overwhelmed and going backwards the longer the game progresses in each half.

 

[TwinTurbo]

Yep pretty much agree with most of the original post. You make good counter-points about Preston and King. Injuries have not helped but I think a quality HB & the forwards is where Gus needs to focus most effort for 2024/25.
This also supports the point I was trying to make about our defence/roster & playing style (to suit new rules) a few weeks back, when everyone was trying to blame the refs for most of our misfortunes. We don’t seem to get many 50/50 calls, but that is because we are overwhelmed and going backwards the longer the game progresses in each half.

Whether we are going "backwards" or not shouldn't change the result of a 50/50 call.

I'm going to call another chicken and egg on the "overwhelmed" claim that "the longer the game progresses in each half". An interesting stat is that the result of our games is predictable 73% (8 out of 11) of the time by which team gets the first penalty. Simply when we start off on the front foot by getting the first penalty we win, and conversely when we start of on the back foot by being penalised first we lose. Often our losses are predicated on multiple penalties (inc set restarts) in succession. For example it is quite common for a try to be scored against us after 2 penalties in row (have look at the play by play stats), where we are are forced to defend for long periods. That's why there is often fatigue in the latter parts of each half.

Whether the penalties are justified or not is a debate for another thread.


Always a Bulldog

 

[The_Chimpster]

Your comments on both centres are huge reasons on why we’re being dominated physically on our edges … unfortunately we’re not in a position as a team right now for Averillo to play another 30 or so games in that position, or for Alamoti to finally gain the needed experience to dominate !!

What do they both need, another 12 - 24 - 36 months .. sorry but I’m not patient enough for that.

Firstly I feel Averillo has more to offer the team in other positions and I feel Alamoti’s not ready, and unfortunately we’re not in a situation where 1st grade can nurse him in a dominating pack as we used to do back when we were a full on development club ..

Have a look at the top 6 teams in the comp, look at the way their centres can play like a forward type role when it comes to busting tackles and making metres, they’re strong and hard to bring down plus they can run when they need to or they get it to their winger.

We don’t have that and it’s a huge part of why we’re being out powered.

Avo isn't being moved as ciraldo clearly sees him as a centre and he's going pretty well there imo, you can't expect alamoti to just start dominating teams in his first year with a severely depleted team. They don't need "36 or 24 months" wait until next season before you start writing them off as both will be fine if given time to develop there but I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on that one.

 

[lovemachine]

Yet we have Paulo, Haas, Horsborough & many other big forwards who play 60 minutes a game. You can still find big forwards who can play big minutes in this game and then you can also find smaller mobile forwards like Murray who run through brick walls for 80 minutes. The secret is recruitment. We buy peahearts like TPJ & impotent forwards like Thompson on big coin who cant play minutes, cant get any post contact metres & dont really give a shit about our club or whether we win.

True, but Haas and Paulo are the cream of the crop.
Horsboroigh isn’t that big I don’t think?

All I know is that a few years back the raiders tried this, and built The biggest pack the nrl had ever seen and they kept getting run down the second half. And that was before the rule changes.

more recently, the titans have tried something similar and been towards the bottom of the table.

it really just comes down to heart and skill, and the right mix, interchange use and game plan.

 

[Suave]

I'm honestly most disappointed in our defense. Our attack of course needs work but regardless of injuries there's no excuses for some of the soft tries we've conceded this year.

Not for nothing, Panthers have conceded 6, 4 and 4 the past 3 weeks and against good opponents. Doing pretty well without their so called defensive mastermind coach.

 

[1967]

Here’s the problem when you choose the ignore feature, their comments might be blocked and replaced with a show spoiler tag, but you still see their comments if someone chooses to respond to them.

His comment here is exactly why I’ve chosen to ignore the bloke ..

I’m talking we need more power in the team, especially the props and the centres.

He’s saying on that note we wouldn’t have debuted King or Preston, why wouldn’t we? they’re actually 2 players in the team that do bring power, my point is we need to go find and debut more of those type players.

Then he’s mentioning JAC, Averillo, Xerri ….. of cause you need speed in your team, but it needs to be balanced around a powerful squad, the teams that are out muscling us have players that have both speed and power.

Look at how JAC performed at the Storm with the powerful forwards they had and beside a powerful centre like Olam, 23 try’s in his last season there.

Averillo is going well at centre because he has speed, if he hadn’t used it to score those try’s people would be ripping him a new one because as hard as he try’s he gets out muscle in defence, I’d go as far as saying for every good thing he’s done in attack it’s been undone because of that defensive issue, I really like Averillo, I’d like to see him at 6, I don’t feel he has the power game to be a long term centre.

Xerri, well he’s an unknown, after 4 years out, no one knows what we’re getting, he might still be quick, but how will he go with the pace of the game and handle the more powerful seasoned players coming at him ..

If you watched our games against Raiders, Warriors, Manly, Canberra, Sharks and such, and couldn’t see that we were getting out muscled then your not watching close enough.

Think about last season, even with Vaughan, Thompson, TPJ etc. in the team we still struggled to get out of our own half, one of the reasons for that is we’re not powerful or aggressive enough all over the park to help those blokes out.

I’ve also mentioned that we don’t need to go and buy elite, there’s powerful players like King & Preston out there that suit what we need that are waiting for their chance, that are stuck behind others, we just need to identify that they definitely have what we need and go after it ..

It’s just JMO, but we are not going to foot it with Sharks, Manly, Canberra, Warriors, Dolphins, Bronco’s and such until we focus on building a more powerful pack ..