8/8/2014

[voicefromthehill]

Yep, we hitched our wagon full of eggs to the DCE train and it's been a downhill slope ever since.

Because all this talk is hindsight and hypothetical - which half should we have taken on 4 or 5 years ago?

 

[Chip and Chase]

We all love a hindsight expert

I wouldn't consider them hindsight experts, they just extended him for 2 more years so clearly they don't learn.

It was a gamble, probably worth a shot if we are being honest, based on how he looked with one of the best Manly sides ever assembled around him. But it didn't pay off, so move on. Don't try and double down.

 

[voicefromthehill]

I wouldn't consider them hindsight experts, they just extended him for 2 more years so clearly they don't learn.

It was a gamble, probably worth a shot if we are being honest, based on how he looked with one of the best Manly sides ever assembled around him. But it didn't pay off, so move on. Don't try and double d

That was my point - you called the signing stupid and then next post say it was a worth a shot gamble....

 

[Chip and Chase]

Because all this talk is hindsight and hypothetical - which half should we have taken on 4 or 5 years ago?

The sliding doors argument is moot. It's not the fact that we signed him, it's the fact we signed him for 8 years. Gives you no escape route. Sign him for 3-4 years and if it doesn't work out then you can look at options. Plenty of halves have come and gone over the last 4 or 5 years. Out of the current lot of NRL halves you could have at least been in with a show of picking up Cleary, Hughes, Hynes. Walker etc... they have all signed a contract of some description since 2015.

We'll never know because we have never been in the market.

 

[Chip and Chase]

That was my point - you called the signing stupid and then next post say it was a worth a shot gamble....

My bad, I shouldn't have confused the issue. Let's just stick with "it was stupid".

 

[lsz]

Tooves is a great coach and anyone who thinks otherwise can get ****ed.

He was part of the dream team that took us from the dead to win 40-0 in 2008 and beat the Warriors in 2011. Des hasn’t replicated the success he had when Tooves was in his stable.

Also Tooves is much better than Kevin farkin Walters

To be honest I am not sure as it felt like Des’s team he was coaching (still up to him to get the best out of them again). The great coaches are the ones who can rebuild a team over and over - this is where des really needs another prem to be in the top rank

 

[JenEagle]

Had a terrible run with injuries the past 6 or 7 years as well . Nearly good enough to progress to a G F in 2019 without Turbo and close again last season albeit with a full strength side . Semi finalist in 2017 . Need everything going Manly "s way with 3 players taking up virtually a 3 rd of the cap and modest T P A " s in the mix . Just an exceptional playing group and circumstances up until 2014 or so and just so hard to replicate . Think that the make up of the side in recent seasons generally allows for really good competitiveness , just that really disadvantageous injury toll . Look at the top 3 or 4 sides in the comp to date , very little injury issues and able to gel and compete so much better and just as an unfortunate reality for the sides like Manly who have experienced some serious injury issues . .

Yeah agree re 2019 team. I’ve said a few times in a few threads we were unlucky with injuries that year and also with the refs in that infamous Jake turbo sin bin against the bunnies. We had beaten Canberra twice already in 2019 and I think we would have gone on to the GF and given the roosters a real shake.

 

[Scorpio]

My take was that the wheels were already falling off early in the 2014 season, when it was announced (or at least known) that Glenn wasn't getting re-signed... which at least one former player of the era blamed Toovey for.

We looked pretty directionless in the middle of that season (as much as you can while still winning games and managing to finish 2nd) and only really won a few of those games by scraping home despite the quality squad we had. It definitely didn't seem like a unified team.

At the end of the season the injuries really piled up and we had to roll out this team against the Bulldogs in Finals Week 2... and let's be honest we weren't going much further with this forward pack.

Brett Stewart
Peta Hiku
Jamie Lyon
Steve Matai
Cheyse Blair
Kieran Foran
Daly Cherry-Evans
Jason King
Daniel Harrison
Brenton Lawrence
Tom Symonds
Justin Horo
Dunamis Lui
Jayden Hodges
Jesse Sene-Lafao
James Hasson
Josh Starling

 

[StuBoot]

The sliding doors argument is moot. It's not the fact that we signed him, it's the fact we signed him for 8 years. Gives you no escape route. Sign him for 3-4 years and if it doesn't work out then you can look at options. Plenty of halves have come and gone over the last 4 or 5 years. Out of the current lot of NRL halves you could have at least been in with a show of picking up Cleary, Hughes, Hynes. Walker etc... they have all signed a contract of some description since 2015.

We'll never know because we have never been in the market.

I'll disagree here @Chip and Chase ( which l don't normally do with you)
The only way Cleary would/will leave the Riff is if dad went elsewhere now and even then l doubt it.
Hughes is another Bellamy project of manufacturing a halfback, yes he's good but he's the sum of the parts imo.
WE already had Hynes but was sent on his way...
Walker, l assume you mean Sam is still a work in progress but they had Flanno and Keary already so...they signed him on spec.
So, out of your examples, we had one of them and l doubt anyone else would have been in with a real show of getting the others.
I think the length of contract has been done to death, on one hand we lament the lack of one club players but on the other bemoan one that has averaged over 20 games a year and busts a gut every time he plays.
Yep, he doesn't always pull the right reign but there'd be 15 other clubs tabling an offer if he was on the market.

 

[Brissie Kid]

Another descent into the abyss came on 28/9/1997. With Manly up 16-10 in the grand final Cliffy missed a field goal from dead in front of the posts that would have broken the Knights. Instead it was a tailspin downwards for Manly from that moment on, the next 10 minutes and the next 2 years were a horror, ending with the death of the club. It took a miracle for Manly to come back from that.