In a battle of the Sims brothers verse the Burgess brothers it ended up being some quality JT kicks and a few Melbourne set plays that beat us. It looked like we rested a bit this week but teh Cowboys showed they were a step up in class. After Manly lost on Friday we had a chance to take the Premiership lead but the weight of expectation again did not help. This is omething we need to overcome in the coming weeks. Top 4 finish is still one more win away. The minor premiership race is in full swing with the Top 3 all losing on the weekend, but we need to remain focused on what is in front of us.

Tom Burgess is coming out of the shadow of his brothers and is now matching or better the stats that Sam and George have been producing this year. He will be a vital cog in the coming weeks.

We have a huge number of resrev grade players missing in action at the moment Gray, Champion, Goodwin, Reddy, Hyland, Grevsmuhl, Neale, Koroisau. We know that some have been rested but players who are leaving teh club are not getting any game time ether.

Our U20's team continues to hang in there for possible Top 8 berth. The win on the weekend means they are now 1 win away with 2 games to go.

So finally the saga of ASADA doping has come to a close with the 17 2011 players being given a option of taking a back dated 12 month sentenace that will mean they only miss 3 weeks. When 2 years bans were considered mantatory, the systematic doping that occured for 4 weeks at Cronulla seems very very soft. What concerns me more is the key individuals in question were previosuly employed at another club and nothing is being asked of what went on then.

Statistically is was a strong agme, but the Cowboys defence shut us out of the game for 55 minutes, as we struggled against a Top 4 defence. Completion rates improved to 82% our error count steady at 8 and we conceeded 7 penalties. Souths Effective 1st tackle for the match was steady at 33.3m. But we had a very poor first half at 42.6m. Missed tackles dropped to 23 missed tackles this week. And our opposition offloads improved to 5.

Looking at our left side defence - Johnston-Auvaa-Keary-McQueen (1-2-2-2) was steady at 7 missed tackles. On the right side Tuqiri-Walker-Reynolds-Turner/Picker (0-0-1-4) dropped 5 from 2 missed tackles this week.

Our go forward was dropped back into the good range at 1440m. With Luke, Inglis, Auva'a, Reynolds and Turner all making 10+m per run. With Tom and Sam Burgess, Luke, Inglis, Auva'a and Walker making more that 100+m in the match. Defensively Luke was our best in the tackling raking up 48 tackles. With Luke Burgess, Tyrrell, Lowe, Walker and Tuqiri not missing a tackle.

Signing off for another week - the midweek Cyber View from the Hill