Tactics versus the Bulldogs

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driftout

Reserve Grader
Lyon said around a month ago that Manly know when to peak and that the boys just LOVE playing footy. Well that "love" has not been evident recently. Maybe it's time to throw out the tip sheets and tell them to have some fun and just play what you see. However , let's look at what the Dogs are doing.

The Storm were diabolical last Sunday. They seemed to be playing in slow motion , looked quite disorganised at times and lacked urgency.. They made 17 offloads to the Bulldogs 3 , but a lot of them were offloads under pressure. Bellamy was at a loss to put his finger on what went wrong , but he must take some blame for trusting Ben Roberts in such an important game. Not only did he come up with his obligatory howler , he bombed a try when he took the wrong option (as he invariably does)when he was in the clear . You could see the plan was to tire the Bulldogs out with 2nd phase play and it may have worked if not for the errors in the first half.

Five of the Bulldogs starting pack made over 100 metres as well as two of the interchange forwards. Their go forward was helped by the fact that 2 and sometimes 3 forwards moved up together to put doubt in the defence's mind. James Graham has a very bent over running style to keep a low centre of gravity and to land on his stomach for a quicker play the ball. This is possibly why he has been concussed quite a few times this year (at least 3 including last week). The challenge here is to muscle up (legally) in the forwards. Calling Jason King and ???

The Bulldogs are the biggest wrestlers in the NRL. Forget Souths.Forget Melbourne. The Bulldogs are the worst. They slow the play the ball down and challenge the referees to penalise them. Graham is their greatest wrestler and always has his arms around the ball and/or arms of the ball carrier. Manly players in the vicinity of the ruck need to have their hands up appealing every time this happens. He got away with stripping the ball twice against Souths.

The Bulldogs defensive line speed was good in the 1st half against the Storm then slowed down noticeably in the 2nd half. They also were starting to employ a bit of an umbrella defensive line (at least 1 to 2 metres offside )mainly involving Morris and Brown which should have been penalised because it was obviously designed to stop the ball getting to Waqa and it was forcing Cronk to turn the ball back inside. Going down the shortside and getting outside of Brown is an option worth exploring. Brown can also be a bit erratic under the high ball.

The Bulldogs markers on the last tackle (usually Ennis/Reynolds) invariably jump the gun or split early so it's worth having 1. an alternative kicker next to the intended receiver and 2.a dart from dummy half if in an attacking zone.

Perrett is well known for walking off the mark to take the tacklers out of the next play so it's important that the players protest animatedly when it happens to at least get him back on the mark . Ennis,Perrett,Reynolds and Hodkinson are notorious for milking so it's important not to give the referee any ammunition. Hodkinson likes to collapse like a sack of potatoes at the slightest contact after getting a kick away.

A short passing game to angled runners to keep the big Bulldogs forwards moving and off balance is key. Players with a bit of footwork like Watmough , Buhrer...wait a minute. DCE on one leg. Taufua with one shoulder. Snake with one hammy. No hooker. It sounded good in theory.

How about Foran on one side of the ruck , DCE on the other with both taking on the line, turning the ball back inside to TRed/Horo/Snake. Target the less mobile defenders (especially Pritchard who looks rusty , Klemmer and Tony Williams) especially with quick darts from dummy half, especially if they are loitering on the blind side.

An attacking grubber in behind the defensive line early in the set usually keeps the defensive line honest. It's harder to attack the Bulldogs when you're close to their line as they are usually offside and one pass wide of the ruck you'll have their players in your backline. Hence a good short kicking game is paramount against them.
 
Get the game to start at the 60th minute with the Dogs up 12 nil. We kill it in the last 20.
 
The problem is, while not as talented, the dogs are a similar team to Souths: big forwards (Graham, Eastwood, Jackson & co), and some speedy backs out wide (Lafai, Morris). I don't know how what we can do differently from last week.
 
It won't happen but I would be bringing up some youngsters out of the 20s and have them coming off the bench to add some spark into the team, Toovey is in charge and can do that but he won't he has got nothing to lose and will be a sneaky tactic with Des as at the moment Des knows the structure at Manly and knows the weakness and game plan
 
Lack of size can be overcome with swarming defence, numbers in tackles & pushing the limits with line speed.
Roll them all day & peel off allowing the D line to set & do it 4 more times till their 6 or 7 kick, hopefully in poor field position.
Have the wingers Taufua & Hiku way more involved to test the sluggish Dogs fowards around the ruck in attack & actually win at least 50% of the ruck contact, to allow DCE & Foz some lattitude to tear the back peddling defence apart.
 
How about dont introduce a t shirt that says decade of dominance just before the finals. T shirts in league usually backfire, eg saints premiers tees from one of their straight sets years.
 
With choc gone it's caution to the wind time

Toss the ball around,offloads coming out of their arseholes, chips over the top, kicking from the scrum etc

Will either jag a few lucky tries or go down by plenty, but may as well have a crack and hope for the best
 
We played really poorly against the Dogs in the last match, and the Dogs are much stronger this week and we are way weaker... on paper, at least. I live in hope that our team is rejuvinated through changed personnel. Let's see if some youngsters are selected.
 
maxta said:
Lack of size can be overcome with swarming defence, numbers in tackles & pushing the limits with line speed.
Roll them all day & peel off allowing the D line to set & do it 4 more times till their 6 or 7 kick, hopefully in poor field position.
Have the wingers Taufua & Hiku way more involved to test the sluggish Dogs fowards around the ruck in attack & actually win at least 50% of the ruck contact, to allow DCE & Foz some lattitude to tear the back peddling defence apart.

That would be great.......If we could actually do any of that!!!
 
Kiwi Eagle said:
With choc gone it's caution to the wind time

Toss the ball around,offloads coming out of their arseholes, chips over the top, kicking from the scrum etc

Will either jag a few lucky tries or go down by plenty, but may as well have a crack and hope for the best

Dead right Dan, NOTHING to lose, go out there, have some fun and see what happens.....what do they say "nothing ventured nothing gained".......if they are cautious their bog forwards will probably just roll over us and wham bam thank you maam , we are gone anyway.

Throw caution to the wind and who knows!!!
 
Blair to replace Tafua will go a long way to helping us win.

Love big Jorge, a champion player who has scored some unbelievable tries but seriously he's too much of a liability under the high ball...

Blair has been solid all year, both in attack and defense, he deserves a crack - he won't disappoint (and I'm sorry but Jorge deserves the bench after last weeks performance)
 
I've said it before and I'll say it again; line speed in defence. A lot has been made about our struggle getting forward, and that won't change regardless of tactics. We tried to go wide and turn the ball back on the inside against Souths, and we tried the same at ANZ vs the Dogs earlier in the year. You simply cannot go sideways before you go forward....therefore the only way to match the Dogs go-forward is to take it to them in defence for the full 80 minutes. You don't need size to push off the line quickly, and you don't need size to be aggressive (just ask Matai).

If we can get up the Dogs face and control the tempo when they have the ball, it will go some way to pegging back the territorial advantage we expect them to have from superior go-forward. Then it's a matter of controlling the ball, and executing our plays inside the Dogs 20m zone. It's our only hope of winning this one.
 
EagleBoi13 said:
Blair to replace Tafua will go a long way to helping us win.

Love big Jorge, a champion player who has scored some unbelievable tries but seriously he's too much of a liability under the high ball...

Blair has been solid all year, both in attack and defense, he deserves a crack - he won't disappoint (and I'm sorry but Jorge deserves the bench after last weeks performance)
Blair is good scoring right close to the tryline but he is not quick too big and after watching him in cup I hope his defence is better. Can see him ending up in the forwards as well. But you can't play Taufua there.
 

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