Official Match Day Thread: Roosters v Knights

[HunchoRooster]

You would think that Elliot will be given an opportunity before Sammy gets back should we have a bad start to the year. Might even jump Sandon in the process.

On our trial performances, how far off are we fitness wise compared to our first game last year? I know it was hot but we still looked very tired and slow.

I think we were sharp last year with the Vegas situation, you could tell we really wanted to perform on that stage. We don't usually perform well in trials but it's usually down to clunky attack and combos.

The last two weeks as you say we looked completely gassed, particularly in defence. Especially our forwards, looked too big and slow. Concerning when you think we have the Broncos first up and whatever you think of Madge as a coach he always absolutely hammers his blokes in the fitness department and its shown in their trials.

[Yak]

I never thought Townsend would be good but I didn’t think he’d be as off the pace as he is. His speed and strength are just not first grade standard anymore. Simple as that. He gets thrown off tackles, can’t flow the play the ball at all and finishes in terrible positions most of the time. So many of Newcastle’s points came off the back of something that Townsend did poorly. His kicking was atrocious also. I don’t think he found the grass past the 30m line and barely had a kick go beyond the 20. The worst was when he shanked one to the right 10m upfield and then got it back to have another crack and shanked it to the left 10m upfield. Laughable. People are saying our forwards were dominated. I agree that they were. But they were given no chance with Newcastle completely controlling where we brought the ball back mainly because of our terrible kicking. And then Young and Nawaqaniatawase would have terrible body position into contact and we’d make no metres on our first two carries. The only respite was the odd Teddy dart, Leniu’s carries when he came back and surprisingly Nat Butcher who was at least finding his front.

Really disappointed that we didn’t go harder for Ben Hunt. There is a bloke that can tackle and kick. Townsend will be lucky to make it to Round 3 in my opinion. He’s just too easy a spot and if you don’t break the line through him, momentum will come off the back of it. I’m normally an optimist but can’t see anything turning around with him at 7.

If I was to give one positive it would be that he did square up inside defenders well and create decent space for his outside men on a few occasions which is a part of why we did actually have a reasonable amount of scoring opportunities out wide.

If Jack Cogger isn’t in the Knights round 1 side I’d be trying to get him out of his contract. He’s nothing special but he can at least still match it physically in the NRL, has a slightly bigger boot and offers all the same attacking strengths.

[Vasco]

Radley should be playing in the middle. He's wasted out there.

[King Salvo]

At the beginning of 2013 Robbo was given SBW, Jennings, Maloney and Luke O'Donnell. Handy players. The first three I mentioned were standouts in the GF win.

Not sure you could say Coach Robinson was given these players - 2 of them were signed in 2013 and SBW in Nov 2012 - Maloney was the only player signed of these 4 before Robbo took over from Brian Smith.

• O'Donnell was signed in Feb 2013 - was playing ESL the previous 2 years
• Jennings was signed in January 2013 after being released by Penrith as the Roosters needed a centre - The Roosters had released BJ Leilua and Tautau Moga was out long term having done his ACL on the first day of pre-season training - Nov 1 or so 2012.
• Maloney was signed at the end of 2011.
• NP had a lot to do with SBW's signing- 1 year at first ( a handshake agreement ) - signed in Nov 2012.

Not sure if Toops was in the 2013 Roosters NRL squad back then ( squads were 25 players I recall) or was elevated into the squad when Moga went down?

[BTRD]

I missed the game & wanted to see if the majority of the Chook Pen's take on the game was accurate...& yes it was imo.

Yep Knights had the same conditions & didn't give up 48pts...if they can't improve on that & get themselves up for the Broncos then it's looking like a horror season coming up.

Like I've said before...it seems like the message is old & no one's listening anymore.

The message would be the same dribble over and over again. I did say that Robbo could play the Riddler in Batman.

[Bates]

Agee with this
loose 6 players worth $4m of talent and sign Chad Townsend
this doesn’t stack up at all
either we have front loaded or back loaded contracts and that has put us where we are today
loose JWH. Let may go somehow and have a shortage of props. No hooker and our halfback injured who is the only player who can create a try

It's madness!

These kids aren't ready for 1st grade and I'm not convinced that Marky Mark can do the job.

It's going to be a long year!!!

[Rooster_Mark]

On our trial performances, how far off are we fitness wise compared to our first game last year? I know it was hot but we still looked very tired and slow.

Our fitness has been putrid for a couple years. This isn't new.

[Bates]

Radley should be playing in the middle. He's wasted out there.

Agree with this whilst Sammy is out injured. Vic can ball play and can size up an attacking opportunity around the ruck.

[ism22]

Hope this works (the pen looks all funny for me right now). On his poddie, Cheese noted that Robbo tells us what not to do during trials. Also last season we had a closed door trial game against the Sharks. Graham hypothesised that this was all about hiding stuff. However, IMO there's various plausible explanations. My thoughts on the trial? Yes it's just a trial and we likely held back. However we did even worse than last week when we only fielded reserve graders. We sucked and I think it's only just dawning upon me that we may well have a rough season this year as we've lost a LOT of talent with no clear succession plan for many roles. Sigh. We'll see I guess!!! Preliminary signs aren't great though, ay!

[bondi.boy]

Radley should be playing in the middle. He's wasted out there.

Where, lock?
*
Let's play "who should be where"/ "where is a player's best position"
ie:
- Radley
- Pauga
- Watson
- Whyte
- Billy Smith
- Wong
- Crichton
- N Butcher
- Collins
- Steep
- DLS Va'a

[Mickie Lane]

It’s laughable to think that an NRL team is going to hide its attack in trials.
Ive never heard something so stupid.
Where the Chooks hiding their defence in the first 2 trials as well?

[Inflictor]

Where, lock?
*
Let's play "who should be where"/ "where is a player's best position"
ie:
- Radley
- Pauga
- Watson
- Whyte
- Billy Smith
- Wong
- Crichton
- N Butcher
- Collins
- Steep
- DLS Va'a

- Radley - second row
- Pauga - NSW Cup
- Watson - lock
- Whyte - NSW Cup - needs to learn how defend
- Billy Smith - Centre - our best defensive centre
- Wong - bench
- Crichton - second row
- N Butcher - bench
- Collins - starting prop
- Steep - bench
- DLS Va'a - NSW Cup - needs more time

[The Lip]

Nah.
This was a trial, on a very hot and sunny day.
A carnival type atmosphere.
Round one, at night, at cauldron Allianz will be much different.
This debacle against the Knights was actually a good thing.
Shows where we need to improve.

yep - defence, attack and effort

[SamKerrSimp]

At the beginning of 2013 Robbo was given SBW, Jennings, Maloney and Luke O'Donnell. Handy players. The first three I mentioned were standouts in the GF win.

Yeah I'm aware they made signings what of it? That's still less than the amount of players in the team who contributed to a spoon in 2009.

So if 2013 doesn't count for Robbo then he developed Latrell, Liu, Manu, Matterson, SST, Radley, Verrills, Butcher etc for 2018-2019 so he still wins out.

Jack Gibson wasn't shit without a stacked Easts and Eels team either.

[SamKerrSimp]

Sorry that’s just my opinion..

Most Coach’s would kill for the squads we had in 2013,2018 and 2019!

They were all gun sides!

Teams that win premierships have good players, in other ground breaking news the sun will rise in the east tomorrow and the sky will be blue.

Absolutely nobody is cutting their arm off to have a Roosters team of 2020-2025 over Penrith or Melbourne in that time period.