Post-Game Discussion Eels v Manly [Round 16, 2023]

[Peter C]

Lol I remember that guy. That was in 2014. John was his first name from memory

Jack Littlejohn

 

[Terry Zarsoff]

Jack Littlejohn

Little Jackjohn.

He was ok. He wasn’t given much of a chance at Manly, in a season that was nearly overwhelmed by Glenngate and Anthony Weidmough’s revelations in interviews with a salivating Danny Whatler.

 

[Uber Eagle 72]

Very embarrassing loss considering the players Parramatta had out their side.

 

[jbb/james]

This thread could be a doozy.

One of the worst efforts from a Manly team since… The last seven weeks of last season? We were truly woeful in every aspect of the game. Our players can't catch, can't tackle, and can't run. And that's just the back three, who put in possibly the worst performance of a back three at NRL level that I've ever seen.

I wish I could say it was a one-off dud, but really, it was more like the culmination of everything that has been wrong with this team for years. We play rugby league as if we've materialised from another dimension and are determined to revolutionise the game by doing everything ass-backwards. We hate possession so much that, even when we do manage to hold onto the ball for an entire set, we just don't know what to do with it. We look like we're in slow-motion. And we are not very good at rugby league.

This resonates with me. I watch Nrl weekly and still see manly play beach footy instead.
Its not that we lose , but how we are always made to look like amateurs in a professional league

even on a good day manly get beaten to the ball in so many different ways through a game its concerning and not seemingly covered under "its a results driven business "
we also seem to think completions are the only way to control possession instead of creating contests that can change that outcome.
completely ignore so many basic principles
too good for the grind

And we came from SOOO MUCH

 

[master blaster]

What made it worse was the way Fox made out how much this meant to Gutho and they keep saying King Gutho, and his garbage talk saying how our forwards came out and said their forwards were soft. I cant remember anything like that. The more airplay they give this bloke, the worse he gets and I dislike him even more. Yeah they beat the dogs last week off a try they shouldn't have got. Yes the refs are still doing their best to get them that elusive premiership and they still get the 50/50 calls , but I am confident they will falter still

 

[jbb/james]

I feel that there is simply not enough energy in our forward pack to challenge good sides. It's a cumbersome, slow pack and unless the opposition roll over for us, we have no chance.

the forward pack v playing style has made no sense for years
this group with sirro, lane, thompson, Tapau. mostly planks.
not great lateral movement or many big tackle minutes in any really jake and the frog aside
Mostly one dimensional

a modest game, full of kick chase seems appropriate to assist the pack assembled. an attitude of grind at the very least. A back 3 or 5 that can ruck until the cows come home. attacking bombs that create contests. A game built on possession

But instead we persist with low percentage plays, and play fancy, Year after Year
we kick like its a burden and positionly lack respect for the kick game itself. Not about yesterday, general

Recruitment v gameplan just dont wash

My thoughts are this is what rots our team. the individual mechanisms in a team dont respect eachothers roles enough so we just get mediocrity all round as No one group is meeting there KPI

can you just imagine a year of manly bloopers on losing the ball. everyone would star. More like Laff olympics

 

[frank stokes]

The big 3 can do nothing against the big boys without the upfront cattle.

Any backline these days can be damaging when the big boys can dominate... unfortunately, ours seem to be grazing out in the pasture!

Ours CAN compete but they make too many stupid errors and there is an absolute gulf between their best and their worst…
Our big issue is that our team are NOT new and inexperienced… they have all been playing NRL for at least a couple of seasons and they seem unable to take that next step and do the basics consistently well whilst also making the big play/run/hit occasionally…
Teams like the Storm, the riff and the rorters (generally although maybe not so much this year) are able to fill their squads with middle-of-the-road players that don’t make errors and do their job so that the high paid stars can get into position to make the big plays…
We are just error city and chasing our tails 80% of the time…

 

[Wombat64]

Didn't see the game, guess I shouldn't watch the highlights

If you want to laugh then watch it ..... it's sad but funny too.

 

[frank stokes]

What made it worse was the way Fox made out how much this meant to Gutho and they keep saying King Gutho, and his garbage talk saying how our forwards came out and said their forwards were soft. I cant remember anything like that. The more airplay they give this bloke, the worse he gets and I dislike him even more. Yeah they beat the dogs last week off a try they shouldn't have got. Yes the refs are still doing their best to get them that elusive premiership and they still get the 50/50 calls , but I am confident they will falter still

Gutho gets to say whatever he likes when we play like yesterday… to be fair, he could have unloaded both barrels on us after that because we were woeful…
The way you shut him up is to make the effort on the field which we did not do…
I don’t recall our blokes saying their forwards were soft either and I also don’t recall Gutho talking much after R3…

 

[frank stokes]

If you want to laugh then watch it ..... it's sad but funny too.

Needs Benny Hill theme put to it…

 

[mjb136]

Pea heart effort last night.

Schuster is just a show Pony with no substance, needed to step up and lead, instead did none of the hard stuff required to manage us around the park, which was necessary given the lack of possession. Just **** across the field from probably all the players. We lack grit, which we had in the first 4 weeks of the comp.

 

[Wombat64]

Conceded that the effort was poor. Scoreboard could have got away from us? I'd suggest that 30 points in arrears says the scoreboard has 'got away'.

His press conferences are getting as bad as Trent Barretts.

 

[LeonardCohen]

the forward pack v playing style has made no sense for years
this group with sirro, lane, thompson, Tapau. mostly planks.
not great lateral movement or many big tackle minutes in any really jake and the frog aside
Mostly one dimensional

a modest game, full of kick chase seems appropriate to assist the pack assembled. an attitude of grind at the very least. A back 3 or 5 that can ruck until the cows come home. attacking bombs that create contests. A game built on possession

But instead we persist with low percentage plays, and play fancy, Year after Year
we kick like its a burden and positionly lack respect for the kick game itself. Not about yesterday, general

Recruitment v gameplan just dont wash

My thoughts are this is what rots our team. the individual mechanisms in a team dont respect eachothers roles enough so we just get mediocrity all round as No one group is meeting there KPI

can you just imagine a year of manly bloopers on losing the ball. everyone would star. More like Laff olympics

The you’ve got a coach that also likes a complex game plan.

 

[Eagle 1]

What made it worse was the way Fox made out how much this meant to Gutho and they keep saying King Gutho, and his garbage talk saying how our forwards came out and said their forwards were soft. I cant remember anything like that. The more airplay they give this bloke, the worse he gets and I dislike him even more. Yeah they beat the dogs last week off a try they shouldn't have got. Yes the refs are still doing their best to get them that elusive premiership and they still get the 50/50 calls , but I am confident they will falter still

Well said, its a charmathon with a lot of our so called commentators. Gutho can do no wrong, even if he stuffs up and he does they put it down to he's trying his socks off for the team. He looks like a mental case running around sometimes, but hey, he's got the experts in his pockets.

 

[Bearfax]

I think by now its obvious, Mr Reasonable here, is into stats. In the U.S. games are dissected by stats and kids even know players by a whole range of stats. Coaches depend on them to tell them where problems lie.

I look at this Manly side and what am I seeing. A collection of talented young footballers some with exceptional abilities. And I'm not just talking of Turbo, DCE and Jake. We saw the week before the excellence of Garrick, Schuster, Croker, Olakau'atu, Paseka etc. So what happened? Only two players were missing from that side, DCE and Turbo. Are they together responsible for a 70 point turn around. They're good but not that good. Three things they bring though is determination, organization and self belief. Remember they thrashed the Dolphins, who were ahead of them on the table and have now been thrashed by a team below them and not setting the world on fire. What happened?

Against the Dolphins, Manly retained possession 58% of the game, had an 80% completion rate, 92% tackle efficiency, missed only 19 tackles and had 4 ineffective tackles. Now look at Manly against Parramatta. Possession only 38%, Completion rate 66%, Tackle efficiency 84.6%, Missed tackles 42. Ineffective tackles 25. Some players missed a lot of tackles. Keppie 7 (though we can forgive because he made 40 tackles), Olakau'atu missed 4, Croker 5 and the player many are commending, Koula, missed 5 with only 8 successful tackle completions.

So why such a dramatic turn around. They say possession is 9 tenths of the law. Works in football that way. You cant win games without the ball. You also cant win if you don't tackle as a unit. Bob Fulton always ensured his teams tackled until they fell. That, and possession of the ball is why he succeeded.

In a sense Penn is right. This team is a group of champions or potential champions not being coached as well as they should be. Its not functioning like a team. For some reason Barrett, Hasler and now Seibold have not got this team functioning weekly like a team. That's a coaching issue, more than a player issue. Two essential ingredients. Tackle. Ball possession. Parramatta did that without their champion players. Manly didnt. Coaching. Clever players need to be in an attacking position to utilise their skills. Manly didnt yesterday because they were on the defense for the entire game. Coaching.

 

[damiennp90]

It’s the effort that annoys me. It we play the way we did agains the knights. Then we win.

 

[globaleagle]

Well said, its a charmathon with a lot of our so called commentators. Gutho can do no wrong, even if he stuffs up and he does they put it down to he's trying his socks off for the team. He looks like a mental case running around sometimes, but hey, he's got the experts in his pockets.

It must be a constant surprise to these commentators that gutho isn't in the soo / test team seeing he is the most amazing footballer ever to lace up the boots.

 

[LeonardCohen]

I think by now its obvious, Mr Reasonable here, is into stats. In the U.S. games are dissected by stats and kids even know players by a whole range of stats. Coaches depend on them to tell them where problems lie.

I look at this Manly side and what am I seeing. A collection of talented young footballers some with exceptional abilities. And I'm not just talking of Turbo, DCE and Jake. We saw the week before the excellence of Garrick, Schuster, Croker, Olakau'atu, Paseka etc. So what happened? Only two players were missing from that side, DCE and Turbo. Are they together responsible for a 70 point turn around. They're good but not that good. Three things they bring though is determination, organization and self belief. Remember they thrashed the Dolphins, who were ahead of them on the table and have now been thrashed by a team below them and not setting the world on fire. What happened?

Against the Dolphins, Manly retained possession 58% of the game, had an 80% completion rate, 92% tackle efficiency, missed only 19 tackles and had 4 ineffective tackles. Now look at Manly against Parramatta. Possession only 38%, Completion rate 66%, Tackle efficiency 84.6%, Missed tackles 42. Ineffective tackles 25. Some players missed a lot of tackles. Keppie 7 (though we can forgive because he made 40 tackles), Olakau'atu missed 4, Croker 5 and the player many are commending, Koula, missed 5 with only 8 successful tackle completions.

So why such a dramatic turn around. They say possession is 9 tenths of the law. Works in football that way. You cant win games without the ball. You also cant win if you don't tackle as a unit. Bob Fulton always ensured his teams tackled until they fell. That, and possession of the ball is why he succeeded.

In a sense Penn is right. This team is a group of champions or potential champions not being coached as well as they should be. Its not functioning like a team. For some reason Barrett, Hasler and now Seibold have not got this team functioning weekly like a team. That's a coaching issue, more than a player issue. Two essential ingredients. Tackle. Ball possession. Parramatta did that without their champion players. Manly didnt. Coaching. Clever players need to be in an attacking position to utilise their skills. Manly didnt yesterday because they were on the defense for the entire game. Coaching.

There’s talent in the squad but it only gets you so far. I don’t see a lot of competitive spirit and energy in our roster. Your favourite Schu is great when it comes to doing the fancy stuff, the stuff you see as ‘exceptional ability’ but he is much like rest of our squad in his application to the fundamental effort areas of the game.

A team is made up of 17 variables. Too many of our 17 variables are lacking competitive edge, spirit, desire and effort. The Eels did nothing fancy last night but proved that competing hard trumps the ability to throw clever passes and chip kick. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not exclusively blaming Schu for our loss but feel the squad is made of too many players with talent and not much else.

 

[frank stokes]

I think by now its obvious, Mr Reasonable here, is into stats. In the U.S. games are dissected by stats and kids even know players by a whole range of stats. Coaches depend on them to tell them where problems lie.

I look at this Manly side and what am I seeing. A collection of talented young footballers some with exceptional abilities. And I'm not just talking of Turbo, DCE and Jake. We saw the week before the excellence of Garrick, Schuster, Croker, Olakau'atu, Paseka etc. So what happened? Only two players were missing from that side, DCE and Turbo. Are they together responsible for a 70 point turn around. They're good but not that good. Three things they bring though is determination, organization and self belief. Remember they thrashed the Dolphins, who were ahead of them on the table and have now been thrashed by a team below them and not setting the world on fire. What happened?

Against the Dolphins, Manly retained possession 58% of the game, had an 80% completion rate, 92% tackle efficiency, missed only 19 tackles and had 4 ineffective tackles. Now look at Manly against Parramatta. Possession only 38%, Completion rate 66%, Tackle efficiency 84.6%, Missed tackles 42. Ineffective tackles 25. Some players missed a lot of tackles. Keppie 7 (though we can forgive because he made 40 tackles), Olakau'atu missed 4, Croker 5 and the player many are commending, Koula, missed 5 with only 8 successful tackle completions.

So why such a dramatic turn around. They say possession is 9 tenths of the law. Works in football that way. You cant win games without the ball. You also cant win if you don't tackle as a unit. Bob Fulton always ensured his teams tackled until they fell. That, and possession of the ball is why he succeeded.

In a sense Penn is right. This team is a group of champions or potential champions not being coached as well as they should be. Its not functioning like a team. For some reason Barrett, Hasler and now Seibold have not got this team functioning weekly like a team. That's a coaching issue, more than a player issue. Two essential ingredients. Tackle. Ball possession. Parramatta did that without their champion players. Manly didnt. Coaching. Clever players need to be in an attacking position to utilise their skills. Manly didnt yesterday because they were on the defense for the entire game. Coaching.

Agree mostly but dropping balls cold, not playing the ball properly, missing one-on-one tackles and laying on guys on the 5th tackle until you hear a six-again call has very little to do with coaching at NRL level…
It is all effort and concentration (which our players constantly display a distinct lack of)…
YES, possession told the story but only half the story… if it had been a tennis match Manly’s forced errors stats would have been manageable but our unforced errors were off-the-charts…

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

I think by now its obvious, Mr Reasonable here, is into stats

I see. So your statistical analysis suggests we need to have more possession and miss fewer tackles?
By George I think I agree, that's helpful, thanks!