I think anyone who doubts how the Riff‘s season will go after losing Api, Kikau and the sidelining of May, may have to rethink it, they have such a powerhouse engine room, they will be thereabouts all year and it won’t surprise me to not only see them again in Oct, but to see them nail the three peat.
Many Astute judges are on the Rabbits this year, thing is they have become the Riffs bitches. The panthers have perfected controlling the tempo of the game, they compete and stay in the grind, then pull the trigger at exactly the right periods during games to burn their opposition.
They have developed another 9, (Api who) that can lead them all the way, we could and hopefully will be operating the same way before the season ends, Kenny starts and does the tough stuff, we have Froggy, who can and does the same thing, the Riff just manage their tempo so well, playing with the second 9 in their 17, as we should and now can, quite a few teams use 2, 9’s. Froggy struggles to play out a dominate 80, he gives everything, but he can’t compete with teams playing 2, 9’s, hopefully Gordie comes in after round 11, it will allow us to control our tempo when Frog starts to fatigue.
Cookie was exposed last night, he couldn‘t stay with the same intensity as the Riff who played the 2,9’s, they lost nothing when Kenny went off with his HIA, if anything they use that moment to up their tempo and burn the Rabbits. If Frog suffers a HIA or injury we will be even further exposed.