NRL 2018
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@raznomore said in NRL 2018:
@nepia If Lawton plays anything like he did last game then we should be ok.
The beach muscles boy wont have nearly as much influence as Isaac has this year - Blake Green is getting a lot of the plaudits but Luke has been the key to this team this year IMHO.
Dare we say it, the warriors have one of the best spines this year.
Not tonight they don't. Not tonight.
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Well, not watching the replay of that stinkarse game.
Oh, hi Mark!
No Luke, no luck: It's no coincidence that their two worst games of the season have been when Isaac Luke wasn't on the field for the full 80 minutes. Karl Lawton and Jazz Tevaga couldn't get anything going in the middle of the park which meant the Roosters just had to target the two halves. When Luke is in form he commands so much attention in the middle of the field that teams have to commit more defenders thus leaving less defenders on the edge.
It's critical to the Warriors this season that Luke is healthy going forward. Put the Maori in bubblewrap.Losing Lino: Bad enough the score but losing Lino to injury is a worse loss to the Warriors. Shaun Johnson needs to drink a large case of harden the fuck up (He can grab a box from Bully's fridge) because the halves depth chart is running out of depth. Unless....Hiku to stand off and the recently returned Gerard Beale to centre? Nah, just harden up Shaun.
The real MVP: The guy who kicked a field goal from 20m and 30m during halftime to win $5,000. I'm not giving the MVP to any of the Roosters. Fuck those guys.
What about the other guys?: Fuck the other guys. Bunch of cocks. Well, they are the Cocks so good to see them living up to their namesake. So where do we begin....Dylan Napa should have been sinbinned for not one headshot, not two headshots but three headshots during the game. The one where he cut Paasi (which was also a shoulder charge) should have definitely been 10 minutes in the bin. Jared Waerea Hargreaves was committing dirty hits through out the game and only got sent off at the end because Adam Blair called him an Uncle Tom or something during a scrum. The refs were allowing way too much dirty play in this game and seemed reluctant to do anything about it. Probably cause the Cocks have the NRL in their backpocket.
Other negative feedback: So new ownership appears to mean a new stadium announcer and it appears the new owners of the Warriors got Jeff from the Glenora Bears to do the announcing throughout this game. Jeff from the Glenora Bears didn't shut the fuck up for most of the game. If he wasn't trying to sell me a new Suzuki Swift, he was trying to get the fans to chant "Defence" when we were down 24-0.
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Cam Smith retires from rep footy. Queensland's era is probably over now their big three are gone (Cam, Thurston, Cronk).
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@sneakdefreak said in NRL 2018:
Cam Smith retires from rep footy. Queensland's era is probably over now their big three are gone (Cam, Thurston, Cronk).
Maybe NSW might be in with a shout now
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That's huge news for origin. I bet Freddie Fittler had a seriously large number of celebratory stubbies last night, while Daley and the other failed coaches kicked the cat.
Cam Smith was THE MAN in that Qld comeback last year. He was terrible in Game 1, slow to cover ground; no run; failed to get the pack moving.
Qld dropped some established players, brought in younger legs up front, which helped enormously, but it was a suddenly revitalised Smith that drove everything. He ran more than he had in years, and looked like a player 10 years younger. His organisation (of the game, and the refs); his direction; his kicking game from dummy half, none of these things can be replaced by Qld (or any team he's played for). Simply the greatest hooker of all time, and his loss should be the end of the Qld dominance of this series. They could have covered Cronk, but not Smith as well.
Should be a fun Origin, two young teams going at each other.
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Warriors play some Friday night football against Parramatta and it will be without Roger Tuivasa-Sheck who is expecting his first child this week. Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad keeps the double-barrelled name strong at fullback although he could be replaced by Peta Hiku with Gerard Beale moving into centre.
VODAFONE WARRIORS
24 CHARNZE NICOLL-KLOKSTAD
2 DAVID FUSITU’A
3 PETA HIKU
4 SOLOMONE KATA
5 KEN MAUMALO
6 BLAKE GREEN (c)
7 MASON LINO
8 BUNTY AFOA
9 ISSAC LUKE
10 AGNATIUS PAASI
11 ISAIAH PAPALI’I
12 TOHU HARRIS
13 ADAM BLAIR
Interchange:
14 JAZZ TEVAGA
15 CHRIS SATAE
16 JAMES GAVET
17 SIMON MANNERING
18 GERARD BEALE
20 KARL LAWTON
21 ALBERT VETE
22 ANTHONY GELLING -
@sneakdefreak said in NRL 2018:
Warriors play some Friday night football against Parramatta and it will be without Roger Tuivasa-Sheck who is expecting his first child this week. Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad keeps the double-barrelled name strong at fullback although he could be replaced by Peta Hiku with Gerard Beale moving into centre.
VODAFONE WARRIORS
24 CHARNZE NICOLL-KLOKSTAD
2 DAVID FUSITU’A
3 PETA HIKU
4 SOLOMONE KATA
5 KEN MAUMALO
6 BLAKE GREEN (c)
7 MASON LINO
8 BUNTY AFOA
9 ISSAC LUKE
10 AGNATIUS PAASI
11 ISAIAH PAPALI’I
12 TOHU HARRIS
13 ADAM BLAIR
Interchange:
14 JAZZ TEVAGA
15 CHRIS SATAE
16 JAMES GAVET
17 SIMON MANNERING
18 GERARD BEALE
20 KARL LAWTON
21 ALBERT VETE
22 ANTHONY GELLINGWhich Warriors side will show up Friday night?
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Id rather see Hiku stay in the centres, he's been great. Would be awesome if Beale hits the ground running too.
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That was a hard game. Eels were tougher than previously advertised, our defense was amazing, and our ability to turn it up when the eels got ahead was encouraging. I felt less concerned than usual and we were rewarded by the boys putting on two tries to put the eels on ice. Fusitua was a machine but Isaac Luke was the man of the match. After the last two wasted years that man is born again hard.
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I enjoyed that game. It wasn’t a classic by any stretch, but with a couple of key outs, we stepped up and did the little things well.
Despite their ladder position, the Eels are a decent side. They’ve been hammered by Manly, but most of their losses have been fairly close games. They just lack that little bit of class to turn the game in their favour.
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First goal of the season completed - it's more successful than last season.
No RTS, no worries: A good bounce back game by the Warriors, and without Tuivasa-Sheck makes it more impressive. Even when the Eels got some momentum in the second half, they didn't panic at all. It seemed like they knew Mitchell Moses would just stuff up a kick recover and let Jazz Tevaga score. He's going to be the NSW halfback....
Centre of attention: Gerard Beale had a brilliant debut for the Warriors. No rust on defence and was side stepping so much you wouldn't have guessed he broke his leg several months ago. It now creates a (good?) problem for the Warriors - who plays centre? Roger Tuivasa-Sheck is the fulllback while David Fusitua and Ken Maumalo are the wings, which leaves Gerard Beale, Peta Hiku and Solomone Kata vying for the centre spots. Both Hiku and Kata have been pretty good this season but the Warriors have paid Beale a fair bit of coin....
The real MVP: Beale was great and so was Maumalo but it has to be Bully. Scored a gritty try, ran nearly 100 metres and made 45 tackles. Said it last week, he's the key for the Warriors this season. It's great to see his in-your-face attitude back as well. When Eels hooker Will Smith passed the ball at Luke while he was lying on the ground (a dubious penalty if there ever was one) he gave Luke a few choice words. Sadly for Smith he isn't that good of a player and when he dropped the ball on the next set guess who was giving him shit straight away?Bully.
What about the other guys?: They should be better than their placing on the ladder suggests. However Parramatta is a team that plays well for 20 minutes and then shits the bed for the next 10 minutes. Corey Norman, Mitch Moses and Clint Gutherson are exciting but all three make way too many errors. They need a calming influence either at hooker or in the halves ala Blake Green. Plus they need to rebuild their forward pack as there's a few players past their prime in that pack.
Brandy, you're a fine girl: Why does Greg Alexander have it in for the Warriors? Did someone sleep with his missus when he played for the team? Whenever he is commentating and the Warriors are playing, he tries his hardest to badmouth the team.
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@sneakdefreak when you describe the eels you sound like you're taking about the warriors!