KeithSheldon
Well my prediction once again sucked, but this time it was a positive thing for us so yay.
We didn’t suck last week! Hype! I don’t know if it was more of a case of us playing better, or the Sharks imploding at Brookvale once again. I think it was a mixture of both, but I am not too sure. However after the improvement between round 1 and 2, there was seemingly another big improvement over the space of a week. Our defence looked good, our attack looked like it was starting to get there and our forwards dominated the much favoured Cronulla outfit. It was fun to watch.
The Roosters last week were….. well horrible. Absolutely diabolical. There is no other way to say it. Whilst watching the game I starting thinking that the side was kidnapped and replaced by talentless look-alikes, it was a completely different team than what we are used to. They had the best defence in the league last year, but their defence this season has been abysmal. And the defensive issues can’t be blamed on their losses. Everything about the side is bad. Hastings and Nikorima are struggling, the forwards are plodding around and their backs are underachieving. I think this is a big call but the Knights are playing better than they are, at least the Knights are having a dig. The Roosters just seem lost, with Shaun Kenny-Dowall and Sio Siau Taukehoweveryouspellit being the only players that look like they are even trying in games.
Team Lists:
The Sydney Roosters:
1. Latrell Mitchell
2. Daniel Tupou
3. Brendan Elliot
4. Blake Ferguson
5. Shaun Kenny-Dowall
6. Jayden Nikorima
7. Jackson Hastings
8. Sam Moa
9. Jake Friend
10. Dylan Napa
11. Mitchell Aubusson
12. Aidan Guerra
13. Sio Siua Taukeiaho
14. Issac Liu
15. Kane Evans
16. Mitchell Frei
17. Eloni Vunakece
18. Abraham Papalii
Coach: Trent Robinson
The Manly Sea Eagles
1. Brett Stewart
2. Jorge Taufua
3. Jamie Lyon
4. Steve Matai
5. Tom Trbojevic
6. Dylan Walker
7. Daly Cherry-Evans
8. Josh Starling
9. Matt Parcell
10. Nate Myles
11. Tom Symonds
12. Jamie Buhrer
13. Jake Trbojevic
14. Lewis Brown
15. Feleti Mateo
16. Darcy Lussick
17. Siosaia Vave
Coach: Trent Barrett
The isn’t the exact Manly side that was named, but since it has already been announced that Taupau and Lawrence will sit out a week I decided to just go with what I think the final side will be. I put Buhrer onto the run on side to replace Taupau and put Lussick on the bench in place of Lawrence. These are the changes I expect Trent to make anyway.
As for the Roosters, Elliot comes in for the injured Copley and Vunakece replaces Henderson on the bench. These are improvements for the side, Copely has shown nothing since joining the Roosters and Henderson is trash.
Analysis:
The Roosters side is still pretty good, they are just massively underachieving. Latrell Mitchell is playing his fourth game in first grade, but he looks the goods. But as a rookie fullback he is nowhere near the ability of Brett Stewart, who is the most underrated fullback in the game and that was proven last week. The calming influence he brings to our side is incredible, and his try scoring rate is one of the best in the league. Heck I would say Mitchell is behind Turbo in terms of ability as a first grade fullback.
Our halves are shaky, but the Roosters halves have collapsed in a heap. Jackson Hastings is a first grader based on one kick he made in the 2015 finals series, and Jayden Nikorima looks and acts completely out of depth. Meanwhile Walker is looking… well a little better each game and DCE is the only seasoned half that either team has at the moment. DCE may be out of form, but he is trying his hardest these days, he made a ton and a half of tackles last week and was involved in everything. He just needs to repeat those performances a few times and he will play himself back into form. Our halves are significantly better than the Rooster’s clunky, rookie pairing.
Jake Friend is one of the better dummy halves in the game, and Henderson getting injured is a benefit for the Roosters, since he will be forced to play 80 minutes and he is leagues above Henderson. He is the only experienced spine member in this Roosters squad and is probably the second choice hooker for Queensland, behind Cameron Smith of course. And as good as young Matt Parcell has been in his limited first grade appearances, the fact that his appearances have been limited means I can’t rate him as highly as I do Friend…. yet.
The Roosters starting forwards on paper are slightly better than ours. Moa and Napa are better than Myles and Starling, Aubusson and Symonds are equal, Guerra is slightly better than a ‘fresh from injury’ Buhrer whilst Jakey is better than Taukeiaho. However our bench destroys the bench of the Latte Sippers. Lui and Evans are fine players, but the remaining three players that have been named on the bench (one of which will be dropped) have a combined total of 1 first grade game between them, and that was Frei’s game last week against the Cowboys. Meanwhile Mateo, Brown, Lussick and Vave are all solid to above average first graders, all of whom (except Vave) have had rep experience.
Now onto the backs, starting with those of our opponents. SKD is very good but I do not like the rest of the Rooster’s backs. Ferguson is one of those players where if his side is winning he is fantastic, but if he is in a losing side he does nothing. Meanwhile Tupou has done nothing since the 2013 GF, and is a player that is only good under a high ball and crap everywhere else and Elliot is just an average sort of player. Matai and Lyon may be aging, but they (along with Taufua and Turbo) should completely dominate these jokers.
Manly are of course missing Taupau, who so far has been one of the better purchases of the year and the refreshed and re-energized Lawrence who are big losses for our pack. We are helped a little by the inclusion of Jamie Buhrer, but he isn’t the same type of player as Taupau. Taupau is a big, metre making second rower that we have been missing since Choc left us whilst Buhrer is more of a workhorse sort of player and just doesn’t fill in that role. However it does mean that he could take some of the tackling away from the other forwards, letting them put more energy into making metres and less into tackling, so it might not effect as badly as some think, if people like Starling and Myles step up. Darcy Lussick I think is a great player to have as a back-up forward, and will hopefully give it his all to impress in this game in an attempt to push Vave or Starling out of the top squad.
Last week Manly fixed their big problem, and that was their crap edge defence. Matai and Taufua still looked a little shaky on occasion but most of the time they were fine whilst Turbo and Lyon were as good as you can get. However last week the Roosters looked horrible defensively. The Cowboys didn’t go out to score 40 points against the Roosters, but they just kinda did. The Roosters were horrible, however I fear that after that performance there may be some sort of ‘bounce back’ factor against us. That might finally be the loss that the side needed to start revving up and firing. It does worry me, especially since the competition is so tight these days.
Conclusion:
Our attack seems to be sort of gelling now, our forwards are looking better and our defence is fixing itself. We have also culled most, if not all of the ‘deadwood’ that was in our team in the first few rounds (like Wiliame, Koroisau and Green). The Roosters meanwhile look leaderless, the older guys aren’t stepping up and leading their young players around, they aren’t gelling and they just look completely dysfunctional. However….. for some reason I get this weird feeling they will bounce back. And this feeling is only made worse since we lost our 2nd and 3rd best forwards in Taupau and Lawrence. I can honestly see us being ambushed and losing here. So I am going to go with the Roosters by 4 points. But hey, so far all of my other predictions have been wrong, so maybe (and hopefully) this one will be too.
KeithSheldon
Well my prediction once again sucked, but this time it was a positive thing for us so yay.
We didn’t suck last week! Hype! I don’t know if it was more of a case of us playing better, or the Sharks imploding at Brookvale once again. I think it was a mixture of both, but I am not too sure. However after the improvement between round 1 and 2, there was seemingly another big improvement over the space of a week. Our defence looked good, our attack looked like it was starting to get there and our forwards dominated the much favoured Cronulla outfit. It was fun to watch.
The Roosters last week were….. well horrible. Absolutely diabolical. There is no other way to say it. Whilst watching the game I starting thinking that the side was kidnapped and replaced by talentless look-alikes, it was a completely different team than what we are used to. They had the best defence in the league last year, but their defence this season has been abysmal. And the defensive issues can’t be blamed on their losses. Everything about the side is bad. Hastings and Nikorima are struggling, the forwards are plodding around and their backs are underachieving. I think this is a big call but the Knights are playing better than they are, at least the Knights are having a dig. The Roosters just seem lost, with Shaun Kenny-Dowall and Sio Siau Taukehoweveryouspellit being the only players that look like they are even trying in games.
Team Lists:
The Sydney Roosters:
1. Latrell Mitchell
2. Daniel Tupou
3. Brendan Elliot
4. Blake Ferguson
5. Shaun Kenny-Dowall
6. Jayden Nikorima
7. Jackson Hastings
8. Sam Moa
9. Jake Friend
10. Dylan Napa
11. Mitchell Aubusson
12. Aidan Guerra
13. Sio Siua Taukeiaho
14. Issac Liu
15. Kane Evans
16. Mitchell Frei
17. Eloni Vunakece
18. Abraham Papalii
Coach: Trent Robinson
The Manly Sea Eagles
1. Brett Stewart
2. Jorge Taufua
3. Jamie Lyon
4. Steve Matai
5. Tom Trbojevic
6. Dylan Walker
7. Daly Cherry-Evans
8. Josh Starling
9. Matt Parcell
10. Nate Myles
11. Tom Symonds
12. Jamie Buhrer
13. Jake Trbojevic
14. Lewis Brown
15. Feleti Mateo
16. Darcy Lussick
17. Siosaia Vave
Coach: Trent Barrett
The isn’t the exact Manly side that was named, but since it has already been announced that Taupau and Lawrence will sit out a week I decided to just go with what I think the final side will be. I put Buhrer onto the run on side to replace Taupau and put Lussick on the bench in place of Lawrence. These are the changes I expect Trent to make anyway.
As for the Roosters, Elliot comes in for the injured Copley and Vunakece replaces Henderson on the bench. These are improvements for the side, Copely has shown nothing since joining the Roosters and Henderson is trash.
Analysis:
The Roosters side is still pretty good, they are just massively underachieving. Latrell Mitchell is playing his fourth game in first grade, but he looks the goods. But as a rookie fullback he is nowhere near the ability of Brett Stewart, who is the most underrated fullback in the game and that was proven last week. The calming influence he brings to our side is incredible, and his try scoring rate is one of the best in the league. Heck I would say Mitchell is behind Turbo in terms of ability as a first grade fullback.
Our halves are shaky, but the Roosters halves have collapsed in a heap. Jackson Hastings is a first grader based on one kick he made in the 2015 finals series, and Jayden Nikorima looks and acts completely out of depth. Meanwhile Walker is looking… well a little better each game and DCE is the only seasoned half that either team has at the moment. DCE may be out of form, but he is trying his hardest these days, he made a ton and a half of tackles last week and was involved in everything. He just needs to repeat those performances a few times and he will play himself back into form. Our halves are significantly better than the Rooster’s clunky, rookie pairing.
Jake Friend is one of the better dummy halves in the game, and Henderson getting injured is a benefit for the Roosters, since he will be forced to play 80 minutes and he is leagues above Henderson. He is the only experienced spine member in this Roosters squad and is probably the second choice hooker for Queensland, behind Cameron Smith of course. And as good as young Matt Parcell has been in his limited first grade appearances, the fact that his appearances have been limited means I can’t rate him as highly as I do Friend…. yet.
The Roosters starting forwards on paper are slightly better than ours. Moa and Napa are better than Myles and Starling, Aubusson and Symonds are equal, Guerra is slightly better than a ‘fresh from injury’ Buhrer whilst Jakey is better than Taukeiaho. However our bench destroys the bench of the Latte Sippers. Lui and Evans are fine players, but the remaining three players that have been named on the bench (one of which will be dropped) have a combined total of 1 first grade game between them, and that was Frei’s game last week against the Cowboys. Meanwhile Mateo, Brown, Lussick and Vave are all solid to above average first graders, all of whom (except Vave) have had rep experience.
Now onto the backs, starting with those of our opponents. SKD is very good but I do not like the rest of the Rooster’s backs. Ferguson is one of those players where if his side is winning he is fantastic, but if he is in a losing side he does nothing. Meanwhile Tupou has done nothing since the 2013 GF, and is a player that is only good under a high ball and crap everywhere else and Elliot is just an average sort of player. Matai and Lyon may be aging, but they (along with Taufua and Turbo) should completely dominate these jokers.
Manly are of course missing Taupau, who so far has been one of the better purchases of the year and the refreshed and re-energized Lawrence who are big losses for our pack. We are helped a little by the inclusion of Jamie Buhrer, but he isn’t the same type of player as Taupau. Taupau is a big, metre making second rower that we have been missing since Choc left us whilst Buhrer is more of a workhorse sort of player and just doesn’t fill in that role. However it does mean that he could take some of the tackling away from the other forwards, letting them put more energy into making metres and less into tackling, so it might not effect as badly as some think, if people like Starling and Myles step up. Darcy Lussick I think is a great player to have as a back-up forward, and will hopefully give it his all to impress in this game in an attempt to push Vave or Starling out of the top squad.
Last week Manly fixed their big problem, and that was their crap edge defence. Matai and Taufua still looked a little shaky on occasion but most of the time they were fine whilst Turbo and Lyon were as good as you can get. However last week the Roosters looked horrible defensively. The Cowboys didn’t go out to score 40 points against the Roosters, but they just kinda did. The Roosters were horrible, however I fear that after that performance there may be some sort of ‘bounce back’ factor against us. That might finally be the loss that the side needed to start revving up and firing. It does worry me, especially since the competition is so tight these days.
Conclusion:
Our attack seems to be sort of gelling now, our forwards are looking better and our defence is fixing itself. We have also culled most, if not all of the ‘deadwood’ that was in our team in the first few rounds (like Wiliame, Koroisau and Green). The Roosters meanwhile look leaderless, the older guys aren’t stepping up and leading their young players around, they aren’t gelling and they just look completely dysfunctional. However….. for some reason I get this weird feeling they will bounce back. And this feeling is only made worse since we lost our 2nd and 3rd best forwards in Taupau and Lawrence. I can honestly see us being ambushed and losing here. So I am going to go with the Roosters by 4 points. But hey, so far all of my other predictions have been wrong, so maybe (and hopefully) this one will be too.
KeithSheldon
