There must be changes

[hammerthumbs]

Yep, pay people who can’t play????
I give up ! I’ll start watching again when I hear that we actually won a game or lost by less than 10.

 

[The better Robbo]

Parker is a centre who has scored 25 tries in 70 games and gets owned every week. Move him in one spot and he’s the answer?
I’ve coached a lot mate and if you think reserve grade centres will cut it as an edge forward in the NRL then knoock yourself out. He’s a dud and always will be. Never played a SINGLE game in the forwards in his life.

Respectfully disagree. With no Siro, Davey and Olakau-atu, I think Parker is out next best option. **** me if we start Boyle or Gosiewski there again. Parkers 25 tries in 70 games is decent for a backrower...
This is my main reason for Parker to right backrow. Chez has an awful habit of sprinting up and turning in, Parker is a great defender and reader of defence and gets up hard off the line. Parker getting up hard off the line would STOP the need for Chez to rush up and in which creates an overlap EVERY TIME! Parker is too slow for centre and with our current shortage of backrowers, this just makes sense. It also allows either Harper, Funa or Tuipulotu to left centre which gives us more strike out wide. Walker to right centre to replace useless Suli and we start to look a decent backlone with Turbo at fullback

 

[Mataiforever]

Great comment I just saw on Facebook Manly post:
"Not since the days of Michael Lichaa getting picked ahead of Damien Cook at the Bulldogs have I seen such a unjustice in team selection week in week out.
Oh wait, Des was the coach doing that at the Bulldogs.
Pick Cust for 80 mins and get the torment over with."

Has Des lost the plot? I've always rated Toovey better than Des in terms of coaching selections. This could very well be the case here where Cade is a quality quality player and he is playing a hooker, who he has instructed to just 'pass the ball' like he did to Lichaa, that sucks instead (Croker).

 

[susan]

Respectfully disagree. With no Siro, Davey and Olakau-atu, I think Parker is out next best option. **** me if we start Boyle or Gosiewski there again. Parkers 25 tries in 70 games is decent for a backrower...
This is my main reason for Parker to right backrow. Chez has an awful habit of sprinting up and turning in, Parker is a great defender and reader of defence and gets up hard off the line. Parker getting up hard off the line would STOP the need for Chez to rush up and in which creates an overlap EVERY TIME! Parker is too slow for centre and with our current shortage of backrowers, this just makes sense. It also allows either Harper, Funa or Tuipulotu to left centre which gives us more strike out wide. Walker to right centre to replace useless Suli and we start to look a decent backlone with Turbo at fullback

His 25 tries come as a centre and winger ffs. A centre and winger.. Worst strike rate in NRL easily I’m sure. Except Suli lol

Yiu don’t just say he’s playing edge forward and let’s give him 25 tries as if he’ll score them as a forward
.He’ll be mixing it with big boys. They don’t tackle one on one in there you know. 25 tries at centre ., worse than all his peers. That means one thing - they’ll absolutely smash him like the opposition centres do now but a whole lot worse.

Pro -tip. They opposition gang tackle edge forwards ; edge forwards do 15 hit ups , not 6.

If he ever starts at 12 I’m not watching this mess of a side.
And as if he would chsnge our fortunes anyway lol The 20 blokes we pick from will run bottom three - that is cast in stone.

 

[Class of 96]

He was released by Manly in December from the dev squad "for personal reasons"

Damn, I thought he was a decent talent that lad.

 

[manlyfan76]

How is Parker a better centre than Harper?

 

[Cliffymagic]

What a waste of four games with Walker at 1.
With Tommy a chance of going down at anytime, are we just going plonk Walker back at 1 again?.
Should of been giving a proper backup time and experience .

 

[Brisbane Tragic]

1.Trbojevic
2.Tuipulotu
3.Harper
4.Walker
5.Funa
6.Foran
7.DCE
8.Aloai
9.Cust
10.Paseka
11.Olakau'atu
12.Schuster
13.Trbojevic

14.who knows
15.Taupau
16.Keppie
17.Goszieski

Now that is a decent - very decent looking side!

 

[KaZa]

Now that is a decent - very decent looking side!

Who knows will out perform most of them

 

[Wombat64]

C'mon Mark... this is as rock bottom as it gets mate... we are not just the worst team , daylight is 15th

Couldn't agree more..... if we win a game this year it will be a fluke or the other team can't be bothered turning up.

 

[Wombat64]

Lawton is a gun. You obviously haven't watched many games

Shame we can't fire that gun because it's broken ...

 

[southsideeagle]

It’s all very well picking these “dream” teams. It’s possible such a team could go down by 30 to 40 points and be an embarrassment. Oh wait!

 

[Dee Why Eagle]

At one point last night on Manly's tryline, the ball was at Suli's feet... he just looked at it as a panther dived on it.

This attitude typifies Manly at the moment... no hunger or commitment. They run onto the field defeated before the game starts.

How do you fix this? idk but guess it starts with new blood, enthusiasm, coaching & fitness... Not much of which I'm seeing at the moment.

 

[robbiea]

When Walker the saviour at centre does eventually get back there, he is still going to let try after try in .
Im sure Walker is teaching his defensive positional play to Garrick,Suli and Saab.
All four soft as **** in defence.

 

[Brissie Kid]

I 100% agree I don’t understand Jakes role anymore? He definitely tried hard no denying that but I genuinely don’t know what his role is anymore.

To not do legit hard footy tackling anymore as the current NRL rules will punish Jake and Manly for being a proper rugby league forward.

Which is a dumb move in imo. It is true that now and then Jake will get pinged (wrongly imo), but also every now and then he will rock the ball out of the opponent's possession and or slow down the play the ball to help Manly defend. Given the alternative that we see now, I rather risk the penalty and have the real Jake back.

Its clear this Manly squad has been procured and trained for a set of NRL playing rules that are no longer in existence. Its not Manly's fault the NRL did that in the Covid break last year, but it is what it is.

 

[HoldenV8]

For what its worth, and keeping in mind that Turbo should be back next week (hopefully playing until seasons end, not just the end of his season) ... this is the side I would name.

FB - Tom Trbojevic
WG - Jason Saab
CE - Morgan Harper
CE - Dylan Walker
WG - Reuben Garrick
FE - Kieran Foran
HB - Daly Cherry-Evans
PR - Taniela Paseka
HK - Cade Cust
PR - Josh Aloiai
SR - Martin Taupau
SR - Josh Schuster
LK - Jake Trbojevic

Bench - Lachlan Croker, Sean Keppie, Toafofoa Sipley, Jack Gosiweski

• Croker would get a reprieve as we do need a utility, and sorry but that isn't Funa.
• Suli seems to have injured his back so might be out. Now this might give a reprieve to Parker, but on his current form he simply doesn't deserve to be there. Not even a move to the back row would help his cause if I was the selector. So with Turbo back and Walks back where he belongs at centre, I'd bring in Harper.
• Unfortunately the Blacktown wingers aren't exactly setting the world alight either so do we drop either Saab or Garrick? Who knows, they might actually start getting decent ball with Tom back on deck. He does like to throw cut out passes to his wingers.
• Starting Cust at hooker is a must. We don't have a real hooker on deck right now, and while Cust isn't one either he's certainly a damn sight better than Croker at it.
• With back rowers dropping like flies hit with the old Pea Beu, I'd move Marty to the edge and bring Aloiai to starting prop. I'd also put a rocket up Schuster's backside and tell him to cut out the no look passes and tap-ons and start running the ball. Last night he really didn't want to know about running the ball and getting tackled unless it was in our attacking 10 were breaking a tackle might lead to a try.
• With Boyle doing his shoulder, that would bring Sipley back on the bench.

Something seriously has to give. We can't keep going like this.

 

[Cioran]

We should have two goals for the next few rounds. Leak less points and score more points.

We can go some way toward the first goal if Cherry holds his spot in the line and stops running madly out leaving Suli and Saab to defend a 3 on 2. In the absence of better options, moving Parker into Jetski's spot would help. Scorpio lacks speed but he has better timing and mobility than Jack. Scorpio may get rag dolled carrying the ball out from the line but if he gets down low he can minimize the damage. Cherry has to stop trying to kick the skin off the ball every time he puts up a bomb. Yes Daly your sky high kicks do draw ahhhhhs and ohhhhhhs from the commentators but they also land 20 metres ahead of our chasers which gives the opposition an easy catch and time to set up their first attacking play.

We can go some way to achieving the second goal by letting Foz, Cust and Shoey coordinate the attacking plays. Give Foz back his short kicking license and lets see if he can get us some repeat sets or even land a bomb on the goal line. Cust plays heads up football and - unlike Cherry and Froggy - his passes rarely go to someone who is about to be smashed. players running off Cust passes tend to make ground while those running onto passes from DCE end up on the ground. One of the reasons Keppie looked so good last night was that he was getting well timed passes from Cade.

Simple changes that don't involve dropping Des's favorites and that might shift a few points from the deficit column to the asset column.

 

[HoldenV8]

To not do legit hard footy tackling anymore as the current NRL rules will punish Jake and Manly for being a proper rugby league forward.

Exactly what I was saying last night. The new rules designed to speed up the game and make into a better broadcast product for television have effectively taken away Jake's biggest asset as a player - his dominating tackles. Now instead of being dominant, they just attract 6 again's.

 

[Brisbane Tragic]

To not do legit hard footy tackling anymore as the current NRL rules will punish Jake and Manly for being a proper rugby league forward.

Which is a dumb move in imo. It is true that now and then Jake will get pinged (wrongly imo), but also every now and then he will rock the ball out of the opponent's possession and or slow down the play the ball to help Manly defend. Given the alternative that we see now, I rather risk the penalty and have the real Jake back.

Its clear this Manly squad has been procured and trained for a set of NRL playing rules that are no longer in existence. Its not Manly's fault the NRL did that in the Covid break last year, but it is what it is.

exactly - the game has changed - we are caught on the hop with this squad - Des now needs to plan to offload 5 or 6 and bring in some quality at the end of the year. I still think with some changes - Walker and Harper in the centres, Tippytoes on the Wing, Turbo at Fullback, Guacamole in the backrow, Sironen back, Lawnton in when fit with Cust on the bench we can still win some games and be competitive

 

[Brissie Kid]

The NRL seems to have looked at the AFL and think that the amount of points equates to the game's success at drawing number of tv viewers and fans.

The NRL has failed to understand that fans of AFL clubs are rusted on and will put up with a lot and that in comparison most NRL fans are not that easily suffers of poor performance by their club.

While the NRL are chasing new eyeballs they are losing at a rapid rate real rugby league fans.