Some things to take forward

[Kiwi Eagle]

A few very good lessons were learnt that should be tucked away in the memory bank

Our forwards are far, far superior to them, it is not even close. Des should be telling our pack that Melbourne can't match them

Smash Smith. Matai buried him early with a beauty, and he was non existent for the rest of the match. Store that away and do it again

Get in Slaters face. Nearly every time he touched the ball tonight, 1 of Matai, Watmough or Stewart were in his face pounding him, and he was not as effective in running the ball. Matai got him with a couple of beauties

And the most important part of all, they are vulnerable. For the entire match we looked like we could expose them, and not just in 1 area of the park, right across it. We saw Robbo and Wolfman in space all night, and on the short balls around the ruck, our forwards were punching holes all night

If we play them again, i think we can make a slight tactical change as well. Ballin was the man last night that made us more potent, i don't think Heath will have the impact he does against other sides against Melbourne. So i would leave Ballin on for 80mins, with another forward on the bench. Would like to see at full strength Kite, Ballin, Perry, Watmough, Stewart, Williamson with a bench of Hall, Cuthbertson, King/Bryant and Menzies

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

Also, forgot one os the best bits of the night

Questions have been asked of Kite in the past, but he truly stood up last night and led our pack into battle, something he must continue to do in the big games

Imagine the effect it had on the rest of the forwards, when they see Mr Nice Guy get up and plant one on the Dogs chin. They see that and think, ****, if kitey is doing that then it is game on and i need to roll the sleeves up too. That was shown immediately by Glenn Hall, who had a career defining performance imo, he was immense and made a massive statement

 

[mj]

There is plenty to take away. I think Dessie will be saying to them that they now know that they can knock those ****s off. Our forwards are significantly better and if we played just a bit smarter in the final 3rd and got the bounce of the ball we would have done them.

This tight loss will keep the hunger there and you can be sure that the boys will be more motivated then ever to do them in the big one. I dont think we are scared of them anymore after that.

 

[Pepi]

Guys i know plenty has been said about our ability to "put them away", but FFS we bombed a few tries and im surprised no one has mentioned it. Manly had 5 linebreaks to their 2.
From where i was sitting on the hill, Bell made a big break and had a 2 on 1 situation and decided to run himself - had he given it to wolfman we score and its 12-10 at halftime.

I think the boys will take a LOT coming out of this game - and i cant wait to get Killer back - the guy was on fire before he got injured, probably one of our best players over the last 10 rounds.
Don't underestimate the return of Princess either - he loves the biff and would have been cracking heads last night. We dominated their pack without him, wait till we Kite/King/Perry/Hall in the side, we will kill them.

end of rant.

 

[PONTIAN SEA EAGLE]

We muscled up & that's all that matters.

 

[Canteen Worker]

Des won't need to say anything to the players. They will know themselves that Melbourne are beatable.

 

[hoax1210au]

Some good words there Kiwi.
I'm just a bit worried about our 4th and 5th tackle options
I thin matty mentioned it as well we've got to do more than 4 hit-ups then a kick from ox. Can't wait till Kingy and Lyon come back