Post-Game Discussion Manly v Raiders [Round 17, 2021]

[BOZO]

Yes and no.
If Suli looks up or has awareness of where the ball is because, um, it’s less than 10m out from your goal line he catches it (unless he drops it). If you’re gonna be a blocker you should know where the ball is, yeah?

True, maybe Garrick could’ve made a play for it but seeing as it was a pretty harmless kick he’d be within his rights to think that Suli would.

Just goes to show that fullback play isn’t all the flashy stuff, marshalling your troops and forcefully communicating was underscored tonight by it’s absence.

You aright , He still should have looked up to have an idea where the ball was because it was coming down on his head and probably why Garrick did not go for it

 

[BOZO]

We were all on a high from all those wins and now we are all deflated again
Sht feeling when we lose

 

[Remy]

Should've just went walker at fullback for tom, cust for chez at 7. Cust is a strike half just like chez, u could see that in the limited minutes he had. And Walker is an elite ball runner, bloke barely passes. When we did those predictable left-hand side block plays, Garrick normally got stopped often, Walker has the evasive skills and footwork to have made some chances out of those plays. Plus him at fullback and Cust at 7 is just a tit for tat change, doesn't make us mess up combinations and rearrange the side. We made 5 changes for two of our players being out. Why? Keep Garrick Parker combo, make Walker fullback, Foran would've worked much better with Cust. None of the rubbish kicking game from Walker. Would've worked out much better in my opinion.

 

[wedgetail eagle]

Toafofoa Sipley came down hard on his shoulder.
Has anyone heard how he pulled up?

 

[maxta]

Plenty of ppl bagging Walker, Suli, Garrick and so on and yes, they were ordinary....but truth be known we had our asses handed in the middle of the field.
Early contests and I will include up till we lost the ball over the try line, Manly had a slight edge here or at least matching....more due to Olakau'Atu , Keppie and Paseka actually ripping their shoulders in with good defensive contact.
The ensuing patch had Canberra possession domination, including a few 6 mores, dropouts and penalties , Manly basically just defended.....and this could easily give an excuse....except that this was the time to raise the energy/attitude and WIN the ball back and lift, but was not to be...Raiders got a sniff and Manly's job at THAT point was to put out the Fire, but lacked intensity at this key point of the game.
They started offloading at will and Starling got on and looked like Damian Cook on steroids, we were like butter through the middle, allowing Super fast play balls, offloads and some lazy players not shutting gates.
The problem when judging footy ppl tend to question the Manly attack and lack of tries, who didn't get the ball ect....but make no mistake, once Manly lost the middle defensively, Canberra took an Iron fist grip of the game and were more enthusiastic, particularly where it all starts - in the ruck.
The Canberra kicking game suddenly became perfect - NO, the defence offered no kick pressure and were on the back foot making this easy for some average Raiders halves, Williams looked like Joey Johns out there, watch Melbourne clean him up.
Funny thing with rugby league as the games dynamics change every year, but 1 thing stays the same, you Win the middle you will more than likely Win the game and your backs will suddenly look far better...."How did he improve so much, I take it back, he can play" will be comments that follow.
As for Turbo, this may seem strange but watch where he always attacks early to break down the defence and win the momentum, right through the Middle....after winning this area, these other backs get the opportunity to shine....

 

[globaleagle]

sigh

fan ****ing tastic.

5th v 13th.

Man I hate how Manly can tumble like the endgame of playing Jenga. Just looks so rudderless at times. I see our 'only posts when manly lose but totally not a troll poster is back' Seriously, get a life.

Not sure if they had last week off training, but I'd have them there at 5am this morning.

More arm grabbing than an octopi waltz competition.

Hopefully things can be fixed so it's not a dumpster fire when injuries occur.

It's so tough without the teams 'star' players. Just makes me hate SOO even more. Taking the best 40 or so players away from their clubs mid season so the nrl can make some cash is ridiculous.

I dunno, it's just so very disappointing.



Go Manly!

 

[Yaz Eagle]

Agreed. When Paseka and Marty went off that’s we lost it. Our lack of bench strength in forwards has bitten us in this game, plus a short turnaround. With no Sipley, and Jake/Schu back next week, I see Keppie or Taupau dropping back to the bench as well as Lawton, with De Luiz as the 4th player.

 

[alafua8]

We would've won this game with just Schuster or just DCE or just Turbo. They are the biggest attacking weapons we got and where all our strike mostly comes from. But tonight we missed all three of them. Our attack looked lost, disjointed, clunky and predicatable. Plus add to all that defending we had to do with a lot of stuff not going our way with luck. And add to the stupid Jetski selection and not having Cust play more minutes. Just wasn't our night at all.

And with those 3 and Jake , we will be back to our winning ways . 20+++

 

[court83]

Was filthy during the game but expected Manly to lose... My only thought is thank God we play Raiders again.. let them bleat about winning last night .. when we have DCE, turbo, Jake and Schuster back for the round 23 game, we will see how good they are then..

And yes I realise players were missing from them too, but name 1 player in their entire squad as game changing as turbo is??? Said it a million times elsewhere, without turbo were a sunk ship, with him, were premiership contenders (aslong as suli and jetski are kept right the f-$k away from this squad)

 

[Rafferty]

well there goes top 4 lol. Now we gotta do go on a 4 week winning streak in the finals. Don't mind it.

Well we will need to work hard, I just read we haven’t won 4 in a row since 2017, no time like the semis to set the record straight i guess

 

[Pete W]

10 missed tackles between Foran and Lawton on our left edge (although Lawton did have to make over 40 tackles - I don;' think it's a coincidence that this was Suli and Parker's side of the field)

1 of Gosieski's 3 missed tackles resulted directly in an opposition try, plus his non-existent marker play led to the Raiders' first try. Add another error to cap off one of the most costly 30min individual performances of the season.

9 handling errors between Saab, Suli, and Parker - essentially lost the game for Manly, putting a ridiculous amount of pressure on our middles, who, in turn, folded through shear exhaustion. Suli, in particular, seems to have absolutely zero happening between the ears - quite possibly the worst player in the squad by a fair way, all things considered. Parker's butchered try, and general form throughout definitely due to Des screwing around with Suli.

In summary, had Suli and Gosiewski not played last night, Manly still probably win. ****house way to give up 2 competition points

 

[QueefRichards]

I think Saab needs to improve a little in his decision making. Sometimes just needs to run hard at the line rather than going for the magic play

We got dudded in the minute where Garrick was taken out and Saab was called for the pass that was clearly backwards

 

[grassy]

sigh

fan ****ing tastic.

5th v 13th.

Man I hate how Manly can tumble like the endgame of playing Jenga. Just looks so rudderless at times. I see our 'only posts when manly lose but totally not a troll poster is back' Seriously, get a life.

Not sure if they had last week off training, but I'd have them there at 5am this morning.

More arm grabbing than an octopi waltz competition.

Hopefully things can be fixed so it's not a dumpster fire when injuries occur.

It's so tough without the teams 'star' players. Just makes me hate SOO even more. Taking the best 40 or so players away from their clubs mid season so the nrl can make some cash is ridiculous.

I dunno, it's just so very disappointing.



Go Manly!

Yep, imagine how the panthers are feeling loosing a perfect record to SOO. All we need now is for Tommy to get injured and our year is f….d. I know exactly how you feel.

 

[Eagles4Life]

The game doesn't get any better when you watch it again. There were some positives though. We were pretty amazing in defence (apart from the obvious stuff ups by a few inept individuals) Some of the defence was outstanding, and we need to recognise that for what it was. Foran really tried to lead the team by example in both attack and defence, but unfortunately the way momentum shifted to the Raiders after 20 minutes it was never going to be enough. The Raiders had 60% of the possession, 60% of the territory, and made Manly make almost 60% of the tackles overall. While Croker, Keppie, Taupau et al tackled everything that moved, and other players (mostly) defended valiantly, it just wasn't meant to be. Hopefully there were lessons learnt from this by both the players and the coaching staff.

 

[BOZO]

Perspective time

We should have beaten the ordinary unsettled raiders team

As disappointed and frustrated that we are with our Manly high standards

It is not the end of the world . It is just the end of another ordinary game that we played

Time now to getting Turbo back and getting our finals venture back on track again