2021 in general

[joeboy]

How does everyone feel about the season thus far? Our aspirations, a pass mark for the season? Despite my tendency to overreact in game day threads, I must say I’m really happy with the team and attitude especially after our first month where we looked horribly off the pace.

Pros.

Turbo- every team needs one, but we got the only one available

Structure - still a bit loose but much improved,

The younguns - schuster, olakatau, Harper, Saab have shown much potential, they will all be really good players, but need to keep working hard on their game

Attitude- we don’t give up and keep up the effort- great to see again.

Other points

Croker is solid, and has been better than I thought but cust needs more game time.

Cherry is still a bit out of sorts- hope he finds consistent form soon, but there are good indications it’s not to far away

Des is getting some belief back in the team, a Hasler trademark, hope he still has some tricks up his sleeve

I think the top 8 is very realistic, I still fret about some of our players and their ability to do what’s required regularly enough to attain the consistency in performance needed to make the 8

At full strength we have the potential to at least compete with the top teams, hopefully we get some luck in that department

 

[Snake]

I think starting the year with Croker as our 9 says that we are just making up the numbers. I don't believe we are genuine title threat with him at hooker. He can hold his own and do a job but you cannot simply 'hold your own' at the business end of the year and expect to come away with a premiership.

I suspect Des knows as much.

When you look at our roster, it is still a work in progress. We need to get Fainu back or a serious replacement if he is found guilty. Even Lawton is not what I would consider a serious replacement. We'd need to go to market for Brandon Smith.

I think our edges are an improvement with Saab a big tick in place of Taufua. I think Harper has shown enough to say he keeps his spot. Tommy in career best form. DCE playing well with Foran. All improvements on last year. It's also great to see the likes of Schuster and Guac getting much needed FG experience.

If we can fix the issues at 9 and our crop of younger players keep getting quality experience, we could be a threat in the next couple of years, but not this year.

 

[davohan123]

I think starting the year with Croker as our 9 says that we are just making up the numbers. I don't believe we are genuine title threat with him at hooker. He can hold his own and do a job but you cannot simply 'hold your own' at the business end of the year and expect to come away with a premiership.

I suspect Des knows as much.

When you look at our roster, it is still a work in progress. We need to get Fainu back or a serious replacement if he is found guilty. Even Lawton is not what I would consider a serious replacement. We'd need to go to market for Brandon Smith.

I think our edges are an improvement with Saab a big tick in place of Taufua. I think Harper has shown enough to say he keeps his spot. Tommy in career best form. DCE playing well with Foran. All improvements on last year. It's also great to see the likes of Schuster and Guac getting much needed FG experience.

If we can fix the issues at 9 and our crop of younger players keep getting quality experience, we could be a threat in the next couple of years, but not this year.

Yep I see this year as our 1st true rebuilding year.. with the low quality of the competition this year we probably will do enough to play finals ( 6th, 7th or 8th) and how out week 2.

As u said getting the first grade experience for a lot of our future stars is key this year.

Give us a genuine 9 who has a full off season with this squad whether that be lawton or fainu if found not guilty then we will be a true threat.

I think in patches we have shown what we are capable of and in 2 year time I see us being right up there as a true contender.

 

[Chip and Chase]

It's been a season of two halves. Before Tommy we looked woeful and genuine spoon contenders. Injuries ripped through us and it was shaping up to be a tough season, looked like a repeat of the pitiful performances we put in to end last season. Then along came the messiah Tommy and his new found dominance. If he stays fit he can carry us to the top 8 I reckon. We won't go all the way as there is still too big a gap to bridge to Penrith, Storm and probably Parra. Without a real quality hooker and with DCE just playing average to solid footy we don't have the weaponary to challenge the top 4.

I'll be happy if we win more than we lose from here. We play Parra twice and the Storm once before the end of the year, all the other games are winnable I reckon. We should play finals footy this year, which looked like an impossibility after the first 4 rounds.

 

[Remy]

Our season revival has made me very happy and back to loving footy. To go from getting thumped every week, losing troops, being favourites for our first ever spoon to then have one player and a scrappy 1 point win against the warriors change our whole season is insane. I already talked about how much of a freak Tom is. But this whole team has just risen up with him, and a few injuries have given some youngsters a chance to prove themselves and they've taken that opportunity so well. We gotta put into perspective that the draw was never favouring us in that first month but it was just depressing to see how bad the state of the club was. I'll be one to admit that I was badly losing hope with Des, but there's something about that man. He's got tricks up his sleeves and he knows damn well what he's doing. Our structure and flow in attack look near top tier and our defence has improved. This origin period will test us big with about three games probably being affected by it. But on a positive outlook we do have a very favourable draw that with the form atm we should only be dropping about 4 or 5 games max until the end of the year. Looking forward to how things pan out.

 

[Stewbojevic]

I read an article that said DCE is carrying a groin injury that he may need surgery on at the end of the season. Would explain a few things.

 

[Woodsie]

My summary ... absolute deplorable shiite for 15 games straight ... with the reputations of 29 players and coaching staff in tatters ....

Turbo comes back ... 3 games of Glory to Jesus, and the patriotic strains of "we are back baby" being sung by the choir ...

 

[manly al]

The return of Turbo has had a huge impact but also can not underestimate the solid and strong form of Schuster and Harper on the edges and the improvement there , especially in defence . And apart from Sunday i st half , a serious improvement in completion rates after round 4 . hang on to the footy and the points can usually come and then restrict the oppositions scoring options . ist half against the Warriors was something like 63 % and they were up against it , 2 nd half was much better and made so much difference . Plus a bit of timely luck , like on Sunday when the Warriors could have gone 14 up if they had nailed that almost certain scoring opportunity early in the 2 nd half

 

[Snake]

It's been a season of two halves. Before Tommy we looked woeful and genuine spoon contenders. Injuries ripped through us and it was shaping up to be a tough season, looked like a repeat of the pitiful performances we put in to end last season. Then along came the messiah Tommy and his new found dominance. If he stays fit he can carry us to the top 8 I reckon. We won't go all the way as there is still too big a gap to bridge to Penrith, Storm and probably Parra. Without a real quality hooker and with DCE just playing average to solid footy we don't have the weaponary to challenge the top 4.

I'll be happy if we win more than we lose from here. We play Parra twice and the Storm once before the end of the year, all the other games are winnable I reckon. We should play finals footy this year, which looked like an impossibility after the first 4 rounds.

I know you’re not a big DCE fan and but even the hardest critic would have to say he was pretty bloody good on Sunday. It was one of his best games in years.

 

[IQofalimabean]

The good Harper, Saab, Turbo and the ugly Walker, Suli.

 

[manly al]

The good Harper, Saab, Turbo and the ugly Walker, Suli.

Ugly , bit offensive to Walker and Suli but better then being bad i guess .

 

[Scorpio]

How does everyone feel about the season thus far? Our aspirations, a pass mark for the season? Despite my tendency to overreact in game day threads, I must say I’m really happy with the team and attitude especially after our first month where we looked horribly off the pace.

On Sunday we were not much better than we were at the start of the season.

I am pretty confident in saying that if Tom was not there on Sunday (scoring or laying on 6 of our 7 tries), we would have been lapped just as badly as we were in rounds 1-4.

Not only did we concede 32 points but we were also doing things like kicking the ball dead from 30m out with 5 minutes to go, and repeatedly tripping over ourselves when fielding kicks. Not signs of a coherent and focused team.

As long as Tom is there we will win more than we lose... but without him we are still in a lot of trouble.

 

[Brisbane Tragic]

How does everyone feel about the season thus far? Our aspirations, a pass mark for the season? Despite my tendency to overreact in game day threads, I must say I’m really happy with the team and attitude especially after our first month where we looked horribly off the pace.

Pros.

Turbo- every team needs one, but we got the only one available

Structure - still a bit loose but much improved,

The younguns - schuster, olakatau, Harper, Saab have shown much potential, they will all be really good players, but need to keep working hard on their game

Attitude- we don’t give up and keep up the effort- great to see again.

Other points

Croker is solid, and has been better than I thought but cust needs more game time.

Cherry is still a bit out of sorts- hope he finds consistent form soon, but there are good indications it’s not to far away

Des is getting some belief back in the team, a Hasler trademark, hope he still has some tricks up his sleeve

I think the top 8 is very realistic, I still fret about some of our players and their ability to do what’s required regularly enough to attain the consistency in performance needed to make the 8

At full strength we have the potential to at least compete with the top teams, hopefully we get some luck in that department

Without any more significant injuries to our significant players I am certain we can make the 8 this year. But that is a big IF. Will we be there on GF day - no but will we make a noise in the semi's yes I think we can. Purely depends on the injury issue - pretty simple.

 

[Cliffymagic]

With Tommy and Saab we can fluke a grand final win if we make it.

 

[mickqld]

I've got to say thinking about last Sundays game what a terrific performance from the forwards. I thought the Warriors pack would kill us considering Keppie, Olakuatu, Schuster, Sipley, Saddler are all fresh out of 2nd or 3rd tier and didn't get any football at all last year except Keppie. They really stood up. Yes there was some tissue defense but when we were down they lifted themselves and created the momentum for the backline to do it's job. We have some very talented players considering how many 1st grade forwards were out. No Marty, Josh , Siro, Davey, Gosiewski, Fainu. Imagine having all them available.

 

[Chip and Chase]

I know you’re not a big DCE fan and but even the hardest critic would have to say he was pretty bloody good on Sunday. It was one of his best games in years.

40/20 was good, but he's always been good at those. Must admit that I was a little distracted whilst watching the game but he didn't stand out to me. Just a solid enough performance without being great. No try assists (unlucky on Guaca's yes) no forced drop outs, no line break assists, no line breaks. There was a few tackle breaks on the plus column and his defence was good. Keep it simple and get the ball to Tommy also worked well. At the risk of sounding like a smart ass, if that's one of his better games for years then it is little wonder he gets some criticism for being underwhelming. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a bad game, but it also wasn't anything other than what you would expect from any NRL half (only my opinion not looking for an argument, accept you may see some subtlety of play there I missed)

Anyway I'm happy if he keeps plugging away with run of the mill solid performances and we keep winning. There has to be games soon where he will produce something befitting his experience and ability and we will go to that next level where we look really good. I'm hoping that one of those games is against Parra in a couple of weeks. If he can conjure up a top shelf game for that then that would be awesome.

 

[Kevinward777]

My summary ... absolute deplorable shiite for 15 games straight ... with the reputations of 29 players and coaching staff in tatters ....

Turbo comes back ... 3 games of Glory to Jesus, and the patriotic strains of "we are back baby" being sung by the choir ...

Indeed -
Dessies back, he's back again.
Saab can catch, oh what gem.
Our pack has whack, no cuddling men.
And Baz the cat, you still a fan?

 

[Kevinward777]

I've got to say thinking about last Sundays game what a terrific performance from the forwards. I thought the Warriors pack would kill us considering Keppie, Olakuatu, Schuster, Sipley, Saddler are all fresh out of 2nd or 3rd tier and didn't get any football at all last year except Keppie. They really stood up. Yes there was some tissue defense but when we were down they lifted themselves and created the momentum for the backline to do it's job. We have some very talented players considering how many 1st grade forwards were out. No Marty, Josh , Siro, Davey, Gosiewski, Fainu. Imagine having all them available.

Yes, they certainly didn't play like soft teddy bears - and that Saab tackle. Boy, wasn't that a ripper!

 

[Mark from Brisbane]

Confidence is an amazing thing isn’t it , one win and the return of one player was all it needed.

 

[globaleagle]

Confidence is an amazing thing isn’t it , one win and the return of one player was all it needed.

Let's not forget when you go caravanning... Manly do better!