23rd March 2016
Souths once again faltered in the heavy wet weather conditions. In conditions that resembled last years Sharknado we had a classic wet weather game. Souths however committed the cardinal sins of wet weather football in the first half dropping the ball and giving away penalties, which meant that we were camped in our own half and sapped our energy. Now for a 5 day turnaround. Still 11 more wins to qualify for the finals.
The crowd went silent as Sam went down injured. Early in the game he hurt his shoulder but he recovered. But when he went down after a charge for the try line with a neck injury everyone stopped. When he went off everyone was thinking of him and hoping he was ok. Thankfully he was cleared of serious injury. But it changed the tone of the game and even distracted captain Greg Inglis.
It is great to see Tom Hughes fully recovered after his horror injury year last year. He bagged another double on the weekend.
It was great to see Talaki back on the field this week. His power in centers was there for all to see with a strong barging try.
Another close loss, but with only 3 games to go and 4 points out of the 8 it is almost impossible for the U16s to make the Top 8 this year.
The MRC process of someone reviewing the game - then someone determining the charge - needs a review. The reviewing of the game needs changing - I would prefer the match referee and video referee review the game with two club officials. Not a 3rd party group Then who decides the grading needs to consult prior similar incidents AND be the same 2 people for ALL games. One former referee and one former player with a club MRC official. Then the judicary should have the video referee, and 2 MRC review committee members plus head of MRC/Judicary team plus the 3 players on todays panel.
In regards to points system, the AFL have changed Grade 1 to a fine system after picking up the NRL system. I am happy with a one match game fee fine for any grade 1 incidents. But points of Grade 2 should be what is a Grade 1 and same for Grade 3 to be Grade 2 points etc. This will allow the MRC to charge correctly Grade 2 or Grade 3 offences. Also a new Referee Contact charge needs to be added, with Grade 2 being two weeks up to Grade 5 being 8 weeks. Happy with early plea concept and other discounts. However loading needs to apply to PRIOR offences not CURRENT offence. And finally we need to put on the NRL website 3 examples of each grade offence so that the public, TV broadcasters and fans all understand what is a example of a charge.
Round 3 - Stat Attack
Statistically we had a horror first half but improved in the second, which resulted in us doing a mountain of defence. Completion rates improved to 81% from 78% this week. Errors decreased to 9 from 10 last week. We gave away 14 penalities compared to 9 last week. Souths Effective 1st tackle was still at a poor level at 39.8m from 38.2m last week. With a horrid first half of 50.4m. Our missed tackles were dropped to 16 missed tackles from 15 last week. Opposition offloads increased to 8 from 7 last week.
Looking at our left side defence - AGray-Goodwin-CWalker-KTurner (0-0-1-0) decreased to 1 from 2 missed tackles last week. On the right side Johnston-HHunt-Keary-Carter (0-1-2-5) dropped to 8 missed tackles from 4 last week.
Our go forward dropped this week to 1345m. Sam Burgess, McInnes, Damien Cook and Aaron Gray made 10+m per hitup. With Sam Burgess, Carter, Aaron Gray, Inglis and Goodwin making more that 100+m in the match. Defensively Carter was our best in the tackling raking up 61 tackles. With McInnes, Kyle Turner, Sam Burgess, Inglis, Aaron Gray, Goodwin and Johnston not missing a tackle.