On a more serious note, this is a super-critical game today.
If we win then we do it without Turbo (and a raft of others). The heads come up slightly and some small measure of belief is restored - that we can win as a team without Turbo.
If we lose though, then when Turbo returns if the miracle of instant success doesn't happen we are well and truly screwed, especially psychologically - other teams will expect to win against us whilst we will expect to lose the moment we get behind.
The mental fragility of this team at present seems really obvious to me, and is extremely unlike Manly teams of old who were renowned for their grit, the backs-to-the-wall, playing the best when under adversity. That carried our 2019 squad to punch well above their weight.
How/when did we lose that? We had it early last year 100% until the first game of the season we actually started favourites in - following the fine win against Canberra, playing the Sharks, where we lost badly.
Can we regain that edge? Time will tell.
One thing that we absolutely need is accountability for poor results. If we keep dropping the ball we need to start dropping the players. If we keep dropping off tackles we need to send them back to Reserve grade to build some confidence again. Reluctance to do this can be construed as Loyalty - but to me it is naivety. Players who don't perform, get dropped, and don't fight their way back to 1st grade through performance are simply not hungry enough.
Long story short, if we win this extremely winnable game, minus Turbo, it might trigger a resurgence of belief and performance in the coming weeks. If we don't then we simply need to start dropping players - and if we can't or won't do that for whatever reason then the fanbase is entitled to be super pissed off.
