Official Match Day Thread: Roosters v Storm

[Bruce Pickett]

Harry Grant was the difference tonight. His second half performance was unbelievable.

[Tommy Smith]

Terrific first half performance but we have to face the cold hard reality that we are now no longer in the upper echelon teams in the comp.
We are carrying far too many reserve graders in our ranks and we have to get active in the player market.
I'd be going hard at pangai jnr and backing Robbo to get him to pull his head in and concentrate on footy.
Another bloke I'd be looking at would be Brandon Smith as dummy half , we need some aggression and both these blokes bring it in spades.

We have the best squad in the NRL. Hands down.

But that's no use when 10 or so of those blokes aren't on the field due to injury.

I mean look at the state of our hooking situation. Has any team ever had to rely on their 5th choice hooker because the first 4 options are out injured?

It's disastrous luck. And an injury crisis is never a bad excuse; it's just a brutal reality. It's no use having a great squad if half of them are injured.

So I'll give them some serious leeway.

I mean if we get rolled by the Dragons up the middle next week do we say, "geez our team just isn't up to it anymore"; ignoring the fact that a few handy forwards in JWH, Tauks, Radley, Cordner, Friend and Verrills are missing?

[roostermcgregor]

We made heaps of errors , but despite that, we were still in the game.
Any other team would have had 40+ points put on them by the Storm, with the possession and field position they had.
The Storm ran out of ideas in the 1st half trying to get over our tryline (shades of 2018/ 2019 ???)
No BMoz, SST out, JWH out, no hooker, rookie halves, Rads off for 10 - was the result really a surprise to anyone?
I am proud of the effort and heart shown by our team, and I will continue to turn up to the SCG, as long as that is the case.
The rookies in our side are getting experience and will be better off for it.
F*^k the media commentators talking up the Storm, and dragging us down - they know nothing.
Be patient fellow Chookpenners - We are the Roosters

[bondi.boy]

Absolutely pathetic.

we are not remotely challenging for the premiership this year. Making up the numbers in the bottom of the 8 at best

Like I said...we're rebuilding.
And we have yet to replace Maubs, Jake, Cordner, Cronk.

Also, we can't win without the ball.
It's usually impossible to win against seemingly biased refereeing.
Also, our team is too small.

[bondi.boy]

We made heaps of errors, but despite that, we were still in the game.
Any other team would have had 40+ points put on them by the Storm, with the possession and field position they had.
The Storm ran out of ideas in the 1st half trying to get over our tryline (shades of 2018/ 2019 ???)
No BMoz, SST out, JWH out, no hooker, rookie halves, Rads off for 10 - was the result really a surprise to anyone?
I am proud of the effort and heart shown by our team, and I will continue to turn up to the SCG, as long as that is the case.
The rookies in our side are getting experience and will be better off for it.
F*^k the media commentators talking up the Storm, and dragging us down - they know nothing.
Be patient fellow Chookpenners - We are the Roosters

About time we stopped doing that.
One mistake can lose a game.

[Johnny73]

Unrelated to absolutely anything but amino acids are fascinating to read about.

[bondi.boy]

We are still such a dumb team, probably the dumbest 4-1 team I've ever seen tbh.

Saw Cordner say in an interview the other day that all the defence tactics and where our players move on the field are Fitzy's.....that Trent overseas it all, but the defence is Fitzy.

Now that Fitzy's going, heaven help us.

Radley is too 'wild'...runs around at a million miles an hour trying to put big hits on players...that's how he did his knee, trying to change direction at pace, and now trying to change direction in a big hit tackle, throwing an arm out, hitting a player in the head, getting sin binned for 10 mins and put on report.
Being small when big forwards are king these days...see Storm's line up... he needs to play smarter or risk playing left right out.

[Thirteen]

Absolute shyte display by the ref - was a disgrace

Yeh let’s blame the ref.

[Thirteen]

Like I said...we're rebuilding.
And we have yet to replace Maubs, Jake, Cordner, Cronk.

Also, we can't win without the ball.
It's usually impossible to win against seemingly biased refereeing.
Also, our team is too small.

Screw your rebuilding excuse. We have many injuries. That’s why we can’t compete. But you just tell yourself we’re rebuilding if that makes you feel better.

[Thirteen]

A spirited effort from everyone just a case of Melb being too good, this team for all its injuries have been really giving it 100%. A bit unfair to criticise Marshchke considering he wasn't in our plans this year and has been thrown into the deep end, our defense proved very solid. Onwards and upwards for next wk and please no more injuries

Were you watching the basketball?

[Recky62]

Now I dunno if I’m a chronic ref distruster BUT that bloke missed about 10 absolutely crap play the balls by Storm....

[RoosterBoi]

Were you watching the basketball?

No, but i'm just hoping we don't get anymore, cause this injury curse is crazy.

[Johnny Brass]

We have the best squad in the NRL. Hands down.

But that's no use when 10 or so of those blokes aren't on the field due to injury.

I mean look at the state of our hooking situation. Has any team ever had to rely on their 5th choice hooker because the first 4 options are out injured?

It's disastrous luck. And an injury crisis is never a bad excuse; it's just a brutal reality. It's no use having a great squad if half of them are injured.

So I'll give them some serious leeway.

I mean if we get rolled by the Dragons up the middle next week do we say, "geez our team just isn't up to it anymore"; ignoring the fact that a few handy forwards in JWH, Tauks, Radley, Cordner, Friend and Verrills are missing?

Injury list has been horrific but it's not 18/19 and we have lost some great players from those sides and some of the ones from that era aren't as good as they were back then.
I don't think some of the young guys have developed into what we hoped they would have by now.

[ism22]

We have the best squad in the NRL. Hands down.

But that's no use when 10 or so of those blokes aren't on the field due to injury.

I mean look at the state of our hooking situation. Has any team ever had to rely on their 5th choice hooker because the first 4 options are out injured?

It's disastrous luck. And an injury crisis is never a bad excuse; it's just a brutal reality. It's no use having a great squad if half of them are injured.

So I'll give them some serious leeway.

I mean if we get rolled by the Dragons up the middle next week do we say, "geez our team just isn't up to it anymore"; ignoring the fact that a few handy forwards in JWH, Tauks, Radley, Cordner, Friend and Verrills are missing?

I don't think we can blame our last loss on injuries as there were too many stupid penalties and errors. Even with our injuries, I think we coulda won with better tactics and can still beat the Dragons next week (who are top-4, with only one loss).

However, I'll note that:
- The injury crisis makes it harder than it should be. IMO it's semi-related to shyte reffing as it makes us have to dig deeper than other teams.

- There's only 1 or 2 a game but we always seem go get a few calls that are either wrong or simply too harsh (e.g. should Radley get a send-off, a penalty and 3 weeks on the sideline for a poorly timed tackle? IMO it shoulda just been a penalty as he lined Munster up properly for a bellringer, then got stepped).

- You make your own luck in these situations. Injury crisis' present opportunities. The Drizz were left without a try for 60 minutes despite a send-off and 2 of our best (available) forwards being injured during the game (plus a long list of other injuries to start with). Oh yeah and B-Moz being injured during the warm-up). It's heartening to see such form! I don't think it's fair to say the Dragons will roll us next week... and they're playing full strength + a new rep-grade big man! Our backline's unchanged (guessing Brett's back?)

- It's early days!!! Robbo's got a plan. Come finals time we'll have Cords, Verrills (plus Lussick & maybe Perenara), Lam, Radley, SST and JWH all fit. Other than Friend (who's gone), that's full strength. IMO that's the best roster in the comp by a long shot...