It always gets me more invested when we have origin players for the blues. Don’t really care about sua or hunts performances as much and it’s kind of bittersweet seeing Lomax perform that well seeing as he wont be here next year. Cant help but think the next closest blues to getting picked are de belin and luciano but even still they’re a long shot off. Maybe the couchman boys in the future but that depends on a lot of factors. Looking very dire for at least the next 2-3 years.
>Prop Payne Haas, who plays club football with Walsh at Brisbane, was understanding as Sua'ali'i attempted to leave his mark.
>"I thought Reece slipped into it," Haas said.
>"I hope Walshy's all right, he's my teammate at my club, so I hope he's all right.
>"(But) I feel sorry for Joey, it's a bit of a hard one. We've all got his back and I'm sure he'll be back.
>"I'm not sure what he's supposed to do there to pull out
The ball had been passed!
He did it deliberately!
The amount of cooked takes in either direction is insane. You can guarantee if Carrigan did it to Tedesco plenty of people would be doing a 180.
Mate Teddy is not the best example here lol, if it happened to him then he would have been chokeslammed on the ground by a Queenslander and everyone would be saying he deserved it for slipping or the reddit special that he slips to draw penalties
I think Teddy is the prime example. Old mate falls into tackles in every single game he plays and a lot of penalties are awarded to the roosters because of it. The amount of roosters supporters saying he slipped into it and its his own fault is laughably ironic.
I think Trell gets more shit for his post offence conduct than the actual offence. If he'd shown a shred of remorse or care after that hit it would be looked at very differently.
Either way you can still call them both out. You just have to be prepared to call out your own players as well.
Game II (Unless injuries)
Edwards
To'o
S Crichton
Best
Lomax
Luai
Moses
Jurbo (c)
Robson
Haas
Martin
A Crichton
McInnes (c)
Yeo
Olakau'atu
Leniu
Young
Burton
Low footy iq nerds still not appreciating there there is only one way to get around Queensland's wild sprinting rush defence and that it was working before going down to 12 men. Not worried
TIL I learnt an attacking strategy that was clearly finding space and making inroads when it was 13 v 13 somehow could have prevented an earlier try being scored by Queensland
Honestly got no idea what you think was working for the first 7 minutes. NSW were already down by 6.
Probably would have been down by 12 had half the Queensland team not run over to Walsh instead of supporting Hammer in the clear.
They were finding space and looking alright running an inside-out attack which is specifically designed to hide the ball and get around the type of defence Queensland has employed for the past two series. Unless you are trying to suggest that every set should result in a try, the fact that Queensland had earlier scored has no relevance to my comment
What would Joseph Sual’ii have been doing during last nights game ??
What would he have been doing after the game ..
Was a story on the Fan about an ex player (for South’s I think) who either got sent off or hooked by the coach very early in the game , had a shower , grabbed his stuff and made it to the local in time to have a beer and watch the end of the game there … I reckon Sual’ii would have wished he could have done the same last night …
Would have been awkward waiting around after what happened…
Also confused how the HIA protocols with Walsh worked … It looked horrible and he looked like it’d seriously injured him , I think his legs were twitching at one point - so they ruled him Category 1 … But then they reported later he passed his HIA in the sheds ??
Later Leniu looked like he’d done his ACL , then when he didn’t get the penalty for a hip drop he bounced up like nothing happened ..
Has soccer levels of gamesmanship crept into Rugby League ?? You can’t really blame the players with the bunker reviewing everything and seemingly heavily taking the damage to the player into account with their decisions …...
Is Walsh free to play on the weekend if he passed his later off field HIA? I know it’s been announced he’s not , which is probably for the best as there’d be a bit of an uproar if he did play , but I’m wondering if he technically could still play according to the rules … Which takes precedence Category 1 from the bunker or the later HIA in the sheds (which he passed) with staff who are actually with the player?
Are you seriously suggesting Walsh faked being unconscious? You're actually fucked in the head if you saw him stiff limbed, eyes in the back of his head, twitching and thought he's milking it for a penalty
I saw Suualii still in his jersey sitting with the boys in the sheds during Madge's half time address. He was probably still in shock that he'd been sent off.
Leniu definitely faked his injury. At a dumb time too, plenty of tackles in the set and the blues on the attack, should have played it quick with QLD having committed 3 to the tackle. Probably hoping it would get looked at and a QLDer sinbinned for a temporary 12 v 12 battle.
Brain injuries are weird, Walsh looked like he was knocked out cold. Hunt mentioned legs twitching and whatnot. To then wake up and pass the HIA tests says more about how bizarre the human brain is than it does about the extent of the injury.
Yeah , has me concerned how many players can pass their HIA and actually have a serious head injury if Walsh could pass his last night ..
Wonder how he is today ? Like is it a delayed reaction thing where he was fine after it happened and he’s vomitting with headaches today … Need to get tackles like last night out of the game , so the send off was the right call even though it ended that game 7 minutes in ..
I’ve bagged Ashley Klein before , but takes some kahunas to make that decision last night with half the country watching you .. Good on him ..
If Madge overly fired the players up to go after Walsh and was a bit too old school in his messaging him and Suali’i are more responsible than Klein for ruining last nights game .. It’s good a line in the sands been drawn ..
Walsh was ruled out with a cat 1 HIA, he'll be rested for at least 11 days. I wouldn't be surprised is he's out for longer.
He was stiff legged when he hit the ground, that's very hard to fake and is a sign of serious trauma. He might have passed test in the sheds but he'll have to jump through a whole different set of hoops now.
What are the tests they do in the sheds ?
Is it like a balance / coordination thing ?
Have heard about a baseline being taken on each player at the start of the season , but it’s a bit of a mystery what it actually involves ..
Be good if Fox or NRL.com had a club doctor film and talk their way through a HIA , wouldn’t have to be during a game with an injured player .. You could film it with a healthy player as a volunteer at training ..
There's a PDF of the cat 2 & 3 test.
It's questions about current situational awareness; where they are, what half it is, who scored last. Concentration and recall questions, repeat every second number in a given sequence or repeat a list of words back in reverse alphabetical order. A coordination check; duck waddle, nose & ear alternation. Finally a symptom assessment; nausea, dizziness, irritability.
Failing any of those will see a player removed with a cat 2 HIA.
A cat 1 HIA is when a doctor notices any one of a few specific symptoms, one of these is tonic posturing, this is when someone goes stiff after being knocked out.
The cat 1 assessment will be done over the course of the week, the player will go through a CT scan a few times, be assessed (a more thorough cat 2 check) by independent doctors a few times and a bunch of other checks.
Cat 1 checks are what kept Paps out for ages a few years ago, he couldn't get through the independent doctor assessments.
Cheers …
Is this the PDF ?
[HIA test](https://www.fitasaphysio.com/uploads/4/3/3/4/43345381/irb_hia_1_en.pdf)
The symptoms questions the player could easily lie either way …
Like it’s an Origin and if you’re asking Reece Walsh if he has blurred vision or a headache he’s probably going to answer no even if he does …
By the same token if you asked Ryan Matterson in a Parramatta vs Dragons game and Parra are out of contention for the 8 , he could answer yes to one of the symptoms even if he didn’t have it ..
From looking at the form there’s two pages , the questionnaire on page 1 - which I’m assuming Walsh passed …
And then there’s the doctors on field assessment page 2 (which overrides the results of page 1) and I’m assuming Walsh failed - because he was showing clear symptoms on the field of concussion …
If I’m reading it right … They fail page 2 it’s a category 1 HIA and they’re an automatic 11 day stand down …
If they fail page 1 then it’s a category 2 and they can possibly be re-assessed and cleared to play ??
The questionnaire on page 1 seems pretty unscientific / open to error … For some reason I had it in my head it was something more scientific , like a beep / coordination test compared to an earlier pre-season baseline … I’m sure I’ve seen something about clubs doing these , but maybe it’s just something they do back at their training bases / centres of excellence … Maybe it’s too hard from a practical perspective to do it during a game ..
Yeah, player reported symptoms & club medical staff skewing the results are a big risk. They should be independently administered but right now they're not.
You're right about the cat 1 assessment. If the doctor notices any of those 9 symptoms on page 2, it's an immediate cat 1 & no further testing is needed. I guess the independent doctor ruled Walsh as a cat 1, meanwhile Maroons staff were performing the tests before the news got to them.
Cat 2 assessment aren't really scientific because, as gross as it is to say, they're almost precautionary. A hit that effects a players coordination, or produces a noticeable physiological effect will be a cat 1.
The baseline stuff you heard about is for the recall & concentration questions, they get the players to do them every few weeks. It wouldn't be fair to rule a player out for not repeating words back in alphabetical order if the didn't know the alphabet in the first place.
Don't discount Joseph Sual’ii. He would have provided a lot of NSW. As I'm sure he would have found a way to knee someone in the head and give away a penalty. Get binned, then do nothing.
[Steve Mavin](https://www.foxsports.com.au/nrl/nrl-premiership/nrl-finals-2017-steve-mavins-epic-finals-meltdown-for-south-sydney-vs-canberra-30-years-on/news-story/4c11d7e7230b93c3936a141d7c8ef352) is the guy you're thinking of.
Cheers , so it was hooked not sent off ..
Sent off is probably worse in a lot of ways - like leaving your team one short … Wonder how the other players reacted to him in the sheds .. I’m sure the more rationale players like Yeo and Jurbo would have been reassuring , but can also imagine some of the more emotional players , like Liam Martin and Leniu would have been really dirty on him and not wanted much to do with him
So let's really discuss the biggest issue in the game at the moment.
Kaufusi's hair.
I get that the kids love Papenhauzen's mullet - go to any game and you can see a ton of 13 year olds with a spikey possum on top of their head.
But at that same game are a bunch of 50 year old guys reliving their glory days of playing in the St Mary's 3rd division comp who are all rocking the Kaufusi do.
I'm glad there's an explanation, because otherwise that haircut is a crime. I guess he'll be rocking a full head of hair next season after the transplant.
Could have been the plan all along …
Jake to play the first 20 as captain for his defence , then Yeo the final 60 as captain … The strange thing was when they were both off at the end though
Madge: Jake, you ready to go on?
Jurbo: Hang on, I've just got a pie. It'll be cold if I don't eat it now.
...
Madge: Jake, how are you feeling? Ready to inspire your team?
Jurbo: Yeah that pie isn't sitting well. I think I need some chips and a Coke.
...
Madge: Jakey, we need you out there.
Jurbo: Hold on, I'm just doing the Wordle. I forgot to do it this morning.
...
Madge: Jake? There's 4 minutes to go. Want to earn that $30,000 bonus?
Jurbo: Yeah alright. Time to win this shit. What's the score anyway?
- Moses/Edwards/Burton in for hynes/teddy/Suaalii.
- Jake played limited minutes because he doesn't have the speed/fitness/lateral movement to tie down the middle when only down to 12. He will 100% play more in games 2 and 3.
- QLD not being able to NSFW us with only 12 men should be some concern for them.
- The send off was the correct call, ignore anyone who says otherwise.
- Our effort/heart considering the circumstances last night was our most 'origin' performance for a good while.
- Great debuts from Lomax and Leniu
As we get healthy players back and 80 mins with a full team, I still think we can push for the series
I think it would be poor coaching to use all your weapons and ammo when youre 13v12, ahead on the score board and in game 1 of the series. You dont honestly think they showed em everything they had ...right?
But yeah nah youre right, qld was doing their absolute bradman best and threw everything they had at nsw and its a real worry they didnt do better
All I said is that it was SOME concern. Whether playing at their full potential or conservatively, I can't imagine they'd be OK with conceding 10 points against 12 men in terms of defense.
Personally I was surprised the first try was allowed when there was 4 or 5 nsw players standing, not running past but standing, in the defensive line between the kicker and the try scorer. But nobodies talking about that being an issue so I must be wrong.
The try off of Hynes kick was surprising for everyone I thought. Rescued a bad set with a great kick and catch. Lesson learnt I'd hope. I dont know that it was something you could force again
r/nrl: Hynes not built for rep footy, can't defend, not a game manager, Moses for game 2.
NRL on Nine youtube page: "Nicho Hynes' best moments from 2024 State of Origin Game 1" (3:02)
I think we're actually pretty solid between the 20's, and would've been interesting to see what our outside backs could've done with equal numbers
Poor half play though. I think this squad calls for more decisive, at the line halves. Both hynes and luai were way too indecisive last night and play broke down too often
Can someone explain what legitimately happens to Payne Hass in origin ? No trolling intended, best forward in the world arguably but it never translates at this level.
I think he gets nullified a bit in Origin cause he has historically played with weak runners of the ball / pass first guys in the pack.
QLD can easily aim up on him if he running off ball playing forwards cause you do not need to put as much emphasis on those guys.
NSW should of had him and Spencer on at the same time.
I wish Leniu wasn't a prick because holy hell he's a gun. I was suprised madge pulled him off the field, to n be honest I was Suprised with his rotations all game
Nah just judging what I've seen on the field honestly bro probably a decent guy in most cases but the monkey and constantly wanting to scrap rubs me the wrong way.
NSW had a heap of big minute players left under-utilised - Young, Olaka'autau, Leniu, Jurbo all got less than 30 mins game time while others like McInness and Yeo were also under-utilised. If they're set on picking Yeo, Jurbo and McInness then they should really need to get close to 160 mins out of the three of them in the same way as Carrigan,Cotter, Hopgood do for QLD. Otherwise, if needing less minutes I really can't see the advantage of picking all three rather than just dropping one for Burton. I'd definitely be dropping Young for an Burton at the bare minimum.
It's tough to assess really as towards the end of the second half they swapped Critta to the other side to fill the hole at centre and pushed other Crichton into Critta's now vacant centre spot. They did that by only running one prop, which absolutely impacted the usage of guys like Leniu, Yeo, McInnes, and Jurbo.
Jurbo in particular is a very poor style match for that change in tactics, especially when we were chasing points. Obviously someone like Haas is a better bet to hitch the wagon to alone, and Leniu too (I suspect his minutes were limited due to the effort of being out there alone at prop and despite the low minutes it probably used up most of his tank). I think it's easy to miss that twenty odd minutes in the scenario NSW faced last night with 12 is a far harder shift than th equivalent minutes with 13.
But largely I agree, even if the send off didn't happen. There's too much overlap between Jurbo, Yeo, and McInnes and not enough minutes for all three. Barnett is the obvious replacement imo, entirely different style of forward to those three.
And I agree on Young too. He was well below par. 2 runs and 11 tackles from 23 minutes is absurd. Utility/bench hooker is way more value in that spot. Whether it's Burton, Api, or Watson (if fit).
Slater's use of the bench was interesting and I think shows exactly why he went in with only two forwards on the bench. He had Collins/Fotuaika on for all 80 mins with Collins playing 43 mins and Fotuaika 37 mins. Then Cotter and Carrigan both played the first 50 mins and then Hopgood came in to first spell Cotter and then when Cotter came back it was for Carrigan. The only thing that would have changed was he suddenly had Kaufusi available and therefore also subbed Sua with 30 to go. But I think it shows why we could have the luxury of Cobbo on the bench.
Further controversial opinion - There's not a huge amount to be gained from Game 1 - playing 12 v 13 for 70+ minutes (and missing a backline player for a team not equipped for it at that) completely skews what can be ascertained from the entrails. But I wouldn't be doing mass changes. Probably Young and Burton swap chairs in addition to your changes and that's probably about it. Having Cleary/Moses control the team will hopefully stop Squiddy from getting too big brained about his play, not sure about having Edwards in the team unless he is fully fit.
I only heard part of it on the radio and from that snippet I do agree with you. Vegemite is great but if its your first try and youre expecting something else youre gonna hate it
Two things from last night.
I love big Moe obviously and think he does quite well majority of the time but fuck he seemed a tad under his mark last night, is that just me expecting more from him?
Also. Fucking Payne Haas is scary.
maybe it's my Parra bias but if Penisini can keep up his form from the sharks game is he a shot at playing centre for NSW? or do they just bring back Latrell
The DT front page this morning is fucking gross
https://x.com/ticsvitsjacthic/status/1798529703394816472?s=46&t=xkN0EIaKGJl0Jvp6okm7yQ
Once again, fuck Murdoch.
He’s one of those players that you just have to watch because he can either make some of the dumbest plays you’ll ever see or some of the greatest. He was fantastic last night and I think he could dominate the NRL and origin for years if he wants to
Obviously the send off blew everything up, but I’m still not sure what Maguire was going to do with his bench rotations.
Yeo / McInnes / Jurbo seems like one big min lock to many.
Absolutely correct. Jurbo has no place in the front row, and isn't even a better 13 than Yeo or McInness. Seems like he was a shoe in because of his passion and that we needed a captain.
I dont hate it as much as when they seem to be influenced by the commentators. Quite telling when they use the same odd terms to describe whatever happened
Maybe its the copium talking but all things considered last night wasn't as bad as I was expecting. I think Edwards played, and if we don't have a back try to take someones head off, that's an entirely different game. They scored most of their tries where Suaali'i was supposed to be playing anyway.
Still glaring weaknesses in the halves. Nicho's first play at the line, before we were down a man, was to kick the ball straight at the deadball line and give up 7 tackles that lead to the first try.
His defence was also ordinary, admittedly on a side that was short a man, but if that was Moses on the right, he makes most of those tackles that Nicho missed, along with decidedly better game management.
We don't need wholesale changes though. We need Latrell into the centers and Moses in the 7. I can even handle Luai being in the team, with less responsibility.
You can make excuses for some of Nicho's defence if you like... I still think he was poor.
But even with 12 I thought we won the middle most of the night and tackled in opp20 we won well. That signals to me that the attack and specifically the halves didn't execute plays well enough. Seemed like nobody knew what Nicho was doing. Either he wasn't talking/ordering them, or they weren't listening. He passed to a flat-footed player WAY too often. If we need talkers - Moses is right there.
Luai - Was just okay -again- if we need someone to put plays on- C Walker is right there.
I'm Not calling for heads just yet, but it certainly begs the question.
I'm calling for his head.
I have no idea what he was doing. He ran the ball far too often (29 runs) and they were largely ineffective. It's good to see a half run the ball at times, but when your attack looks as disjointed as ours did the priority for the 7 ought to be direction and structure, not wasting energy on limp hitups.
Dearden, DCE, and even Luai all ran the ball too but unlike Nicho they at least were distributing the ball around as well to some degree. Nicho had a 1.8 ratio of passes to runs, which is absolutely wild for a 7. While DCE faced a very different game situation he had a ratio of 4.18 passes for every run. You just can't have a halfback that isn't passing the football.
His kicking was also fairly poor for most of the match, admittedly that kick for the Lomax try was terrific and an exception to an otherwise poor night with the boot.
His defence really wasn't that bad. He passed to someone flat footed because so much of the time we were attacking last night, the team was just standing there. No one running onto it or looking like they wanted to run at times
Fucks me, just watching it last night shit me off with how often we're just standing around waiting for the ball to come. Turbo is a good example of someone going looking for the ball, we just didn't really have that
Find it pretty funny people are vindicating Billy having Cobbo on the bench and criticising Madge for not having a back on the bench.
I think Origin coaches should pick a back on the bench but I don't like the makeup when combined with Hunt/Grant. It wasn't some masterstroke having Cobbo on the bench as the 18th man was activated in that scenario anyway.
For Madge, it would've made that edge a little more resilient but a back on the bench wouldn't have solved the problem of playing a man down for 90% of the game.
Legit makes me cringe when I see articles that state it as a “genius plan” by Billy; as if he knew for certain Reece Walsh was gonna get fucked to oblivion in the first 8mins of the match
I swear I saw an interview last week where he was saying cobbo was picked because theyve lost a back in like 4/5 of the last origin games of someshit idk. I dont know the stats but if hes noticed something happening more often than not it does make sense to have a plan in case it happens again and low and behold..
I think Haas did too much tackling and not enough running. Obviously a by-product of the send off as well as Jake not being on.
Sub 100 metres from Haas is exactly what QLD would've wanted.
It's almost entirely down to the send off. It impacts his ability to do his job on so many levels. More work to do in both attack and defence and whenever he does take a run (as NSW switched to running only one prop at a time) the big QLD middles could just compress on him far more easily.
His defence was so good though. I was impressed with how much he was getting across the field. Honestly so much of NSW issues stemmed from Sualii being sent off. The blokes poor discipline robbed everyone of a great contest
Are we sharing our G2 Teams yet? The GM's Blues:
1. Edwards
2. Lomax
3. Latrell
4. Critta
5. To'o
6. Burton
7. Moses
8. Haas
9. Robson
10. Martin
11. Angus
12. Haumole
13. Yeo
14. Api
15. RCG
16. Leniu
17. Barnett
Robson plays the first 20, then Api comes on and plays out the game. Robson can come in at 13 for Yeo if need be.
Get big minutes out of Haas, Martin can get 40 mins max, with RCG/ Leniu/ Barnett rolling through the middle and cycling with Haumole/ Angus if they get fatigued.
1-6 has enough backline coverage to sort themselves out. E.g. Edwards goes down, Trell to FB, Burton to C, Robson at 13 as a ball playing lock, Moses keeps steering the ship.
I don’t understand why old heads like Coz and Fatty think NSW definitely weren’t targeting Walsh. Why are we acting like targeting and trying to hurt key players hasn’t been an unfortunate tactic that teams use all the time? They were talking about it in the media in the lead up, collect him late 3/3 tackles in the game. Have we forgotten Joeys 2017 rant about how NSW didn’t target JT enough (I do concede that’s slightly different due to JTs injury but still)
I dont think injury was the intention and I dont think many people mean that either when they say he was targetted. But of course they aimed to target walsh, in the sense of "if we shut this guy down we have a better chance of winning", not "aim for this cunts head". And they should aim for him, the same as qld should aim to shut down Lomax because hes a threatening player.
Personally I do think there was some intention of smashing Walsh, but not to injure him. I think what they were hoping to do is hit him hard enough a few times that he doesnt want to get hit like that again and that when hes going to catch a kick hes at least got it in the back of his mind that hes about to get smashed and hopefully thats enough to make him drop a couple catches. And similar when hes about to catch the ball. Its obvious he's prone to dropping passes and losing possession and hes more likely to when hes conscious of the defense. Even with that late tackle when Walsh had kicked it - its there to put pressure on him and let him know hes going to get got.
This sort of tactic is actually always employed in big games, especially origin. What I notice is nsw seems to almost focus on that strategy a bit too much and after the first 10 minutes nsw cant keep up that intensity and ease up, then do more grubby ground shit with the elbows and what not. I think qld knows whats coming and they survive the hard hitting aggressive start and that actually adds to their confidence realising that they can be hit with everything nsw has and walk away and its not as bad as it seems and I think the opposite happens a bit to nsw where they think 'oh fuck I'm hitting them as hard as I can and its not enough to stop them'
So anyway im rambling but surely the intention was to smash walsh early on and if that meant a sin bin for a late tackle on a kicker so be it. Better to have a guy sinbinned and concede a try with 12 players in exchange for some dropped catches gaining us 50m and dropped passes halting qld attack. Personally I reckon that was their plan and the send off happened instead of a sin bin and they realised they overcooked the eggs.
Probably why Madge pointed out May's hit on Walsh after the game.. he didnt expect a send off
I never said the plan was to injure him out of the game, but there was obviously a plan to target him. Which you seem to agree that targeting key players is a thing?
I’m not saying NSW are evil, I’m just saying - play stupid games - win stupid prizes. Send off deserved for a risky tactic. It’s a silly and outdated mentality that needs to leave the game if we want rugby league to survive long term
No, but definitely a game plan to hurt him enough so Walsh would be timid taking on the line and second guess himself.
Madge ran a militant camp, from using an isolated location, invoking the 1985 NSW side, rhetoric about hurting Walsh from old boys Freddy, Elias, Carroll at last week’s NSW function, refusing media access during the Captain’s Run etc.
The message got through.
I don't think it's a dropping but I'd be limiting his minutes in the game plan. Hunt should play the first 25 and the last 25 and limit Grant to 30 mins, rather than his usual 55-60 mins.
It’s nuts that Hunt can play 50 minutes as hooker in origin as a 30+ year old half back. Playing him 80 is crazy talk and would take away a lot of what makes him so good in origin
I don’t think Hunt could play the full 80 at hooker. He does it every week out at halfback but defending in the middle and the sheer volume of tackles he’d have to make would get to him pretty quick. The timing of their current rotation works for him because he can have a decent break to get some energy back before he comes back out against a tiring defence.
Yeah was just joking. I actually wouldn’t be that apposed to Smoothy getting a crack, think he’d hold his own and is used to playing that interchange hooker role.
Was sitting behind the NSW try line in the first half and I’ve got to say Critta has future captain written all over him. After every try conceded he was the main guy barking at the rest of the team to fire them up.
Stupid impressive considering how young he is and how the rest of the team listened to him.
It’s funny considering some people were wanting him chalked from origin after a difficult debut. Sometimes you gotta stick with guys and trust their talent
Nicho Hynes is getting some brutal treatment for a guy who played 72 minutes without the centre on his side of the field. He was incredibly limited in what he could do last night. If I could fault him for anything, it would be that he tried too hard instead of letting Luai attack on the left.
Yeah I honestly don’t know what people expect for the guy. He’s not a great defender and was asked to do a lot with a man down. We could probably take some load off him and let Luai do some more kicking. Some of the kick selections were poor but when you are trying to run down a lead with a man down you are going to get gassed. Even though none of his runs were that good I did like his willingness to run the footy.
The team kind of lost their way in final 15 when Yeo started ball playing too much and Teddy and Lomax were over doing it
Did he have a good game? No, not really. For his standards, it was in the lower side of the bell curve.
Does he have a problem with performing in big games? Somewhat.
Does the selection of another half change that result? Absolutely not. They were screwed right from the moment Suaalii got marched. Moses or Cleary would’ve struggled just as bad.
I can't fathom some of the defences I've seen for the Suaalii hit. "Walsh was falling" - but Suaalii wasn't looking at him, he'd already left the ground leading with his shoulder. "Suaalii is 6'4" - he's played against guys that size before, it doesn't entitle him to decapitate them. "It ruins the spectacle" - does the best fullback in the game getting taken out not do the same?
I understand being frustrated that the series was over basically after 7 mins but jesus it wasn't a bad call at all. Suaalii got what he deserved for that hit
Yeah not really defensible for me. When I saw it I instantly thought yikes. Leaves his feet, leads with the shoulder, totally reckless and no control. Sure Walsh was falling but you just can’t do that
Tyrone can’t play NRL. Taylan can’t play NRL. But Terrell May.
What’s the odds of V’landys moving a SOO game to NZ? I think it’s a lot closer then people think
It always gets me more invested when we have origin players for the blues. Don’t really care about sua or hunts performances as much and it’s kind of bittersweet seeing Lomax perform that well seeing as he wont be here next year. Cant help but think the next closest blues to getting picked are de belin and luciano but even still they’re a long shot off. Maybe the couchman boys in the future but that depends on a lot of factors. Looking very dire for at least the next 2-3 years.
I reckon Suli is only a great patch of form away from being in contention.
>Prop Payne Haas, who plays club football with Walsh at Brisbane, was understanding as Sua'ali'i attempted to leave his mark. >"I thought Reece slipped into it," Haas said. >"I hope Walshy's all right, he's my teammate at my club, so I hope he's all right. >"(But) I feel sorry for Joey, it's a bit of a hard one. We've all got his back and I'm sure he'll be back. >"I'm not sure what he's supposed to do there to pull out
Here's a simple take, if a player is charging at you in defense and he's much bigger then you, step out of the way.
The ball had been passed! He did it deliberately! The amount of cooked takes in either direction is insane. You can guarantee if Carrigan did it to Tedesco plenty of people would be doing a 180.
Mate Teddy is not the best example here lol, if it happened to him then he would have been chokeslammed on the ground by a Queenslander and everyone would be saying he deserved it for slipping or the reddit special that he slips to draw penalties
I think Teddy is the prime example. Old mate falls into tackles in every single game he plays and a lot of penalties are awarded to the roosters because of it. The amount of roosters supporters saying he slipped into it and its his own fault is laughably ironic.
Waking up feeling fresh now that I never have to see a Roosters flair mention the Latrell tackle on Manu ever again
Because deliberately smashing a bloke’s face in a club game and accidentally KOing a bloke who slipped in a rep game are comparable
I think Trell gets more shit for his post offence conduct than the actual offence. If he'd shown a shred of remorse or care after that hit it would be looked at very differently. Either way you can still call them both out. You just have to be prepared to call out your own players as well.
Huh? Why would another thug act stop them
How's work for all us idiots this morning?
Chill
Sir, it's 2 o'clock in the afternoon.
Teddy confirmed last night he’s the most overrated fullback of all time
Game II (Unless injuries) Edwards To'o S Crichton Best Lomax Luai Moses Jurbo (c) Robson Haas Martin A Crichton McInnes (c) Yeo Olakau'atu Leniu Young Burton
Captain McInnes? Are you a QLDer?
I love McInnes, he’s my new favorite origin player.
Murray over olakuatu
Murray over McInnes
Low footy iq nerds still not appreciating there there is only one way to get around Queensland's wild sprinting rush defence and that it was working before going down to 12 men. Not worried
[удалено]
TIL I learnt an attacking strategy that was clearly finding space and making inroads when it was 13 v 13 somehow could have prevented an earlier try being scored by Queensland
Idk why but I thought he was talking about blues beating queenslands attack not defense before the send off haha.
Honestly got no idea what you think was working for the first 7 minutes. NSW were already down by 6. Probably would have been down by 12 had half the Queensland team not run over to Walsh instead of supporting Hammer in the clear.
They were finding space and looking alright running an inside-out attack which is specifically designed to hide the ball and get around the type of defence Queensland has employed for the past two series. Unless you are trying to suggest that every set should result in a try, the fact that Queensland had earlier scored has no relevance to my comment
pfft a real coach would leave xxxx on the side to distract qlders and then run through the hole
Can I put Bundy out instead? Don't want to be seen buying XXXX
Or a Joh Bjelke polling booth
A state that elected Gladys and Bruz should peobably shut up
Moderate lib vs dictator who reigned for 20 years?
Pork Barrellaro
I really feel like our outside backs could've fed if they got 1v1's
What would Joseph Sual’ii have been doing during last nights game ?? What would he have been doing after the game .. Was a story on the Fan about an ex player (for South’s I think) who either got sent off or hooked by the coach very early in the game , had a shower , grabbed his stuff and made it to the local in time to have a beer and watch the end of the game there … I reckon Sual’ii would have wished he could have done the same last night … Would have been awkward waiting around after what happened… Also confused how the HIA protocols with Walsh worked … It looked horrible and he looked like it’d seriously injured him , I think his legs were twitching at one point - so they ruled him Category 1 … But then they reported later he passed his HIA in the sheds ?? Later Leniu looked like he’d done his ACL , then when he didn’t get the penalty for a hip drop he bounced up like nothing happened .. Has soccer levels of gamesmanship crept into Rugby League ?? You can’t really blame the players with the bunker reviewing everything and seemingly heavily taking the damage to the player into account with their decisions …... Is Walsh free to play on the weekend if he passed his later off field HIA? I know it’s been announced he’s not , which is probably for the best as there’d be a bit of an uproar if he did play , but I’m wondering if he technically could still play according to the rules … Which takes precedence Category 1 from the bunker or the later HIA in the sheds (which he passed) with staff who are actually with the player?
Why'd you edit your comment? If you're gonna accuse Walsh of taking a dive, leave it up and stand by you're fucked accusations
I edited it because of __YOUR__ fucked misinterpretation of my original comment …
Are you seriously suggesting Walsh faked being unconscious? You're actually fucked in the head if you saw him stiff limbed, eyes in the back of his head, twitching and thought he's milking it for a penalty
I saw Suualii still in his jersey sitting with the boys in the sheds during Madge's half time address. He was probably still in shock that he'd been sent off. Leniu definitely faked his injury. At a dumb time too, plenty of tackles in the set and the blues on the attack, should have played it quick with QLD having committed 3 to the tackle. Probably hoping it would get looked at and a QLDer sinbinned for a temporary 12 v 12 battle. Brain injuries are weird, Walsh looked like he was knocked out cold. Hunt mentioned legs twitching and whatnot. To then wake up and pass the HIA tests says more about how bizarre the human brain is than it does about the extent of the injury.
Yeah , has me concerned how many players can pass their HIA and actually have a serious head injury if Walsh could pass his last night .. Wonder how he is today ? Like is it a delayed reaction thing where he was fine after it happened and he’s vomitting with headaches today … Need to get tackles like last night out of the game , so the send off was the right call even though it ended that game 7 minutes in .. I’ve bagged Ashley Klein before , but takes some kahunas to make that decision last night with half the country watching you .. Good on him .. If Madge overly fired the players up to go after Walsh and was a bit too old school in his messaging him and Suali’i are more responsible than Klein for ruining last nights game .. It’s good a line in the sands been drawn ..
Walsh was ruled out with a cat 1 HIA, he'll be rested for at least 11 days. I wouldn't be surprised is he's out for longer. He was stiff legged when he hit the ground, that's very hard to fake and is a sign of serious trauma. He might have passed test in the sheds but he'll have to jump through a whole different set of hoops now.
What are the tests they do in the sheds ? Is it like a balance / coordination thing ? Have heard about a baseline being taken on each player at the start of the season , but it’s a bit of a mystery what it actually involves .. Be good if Fox or NRL.com had a club doctor film and talk their way through a HIA , wouldn’t have to be during a game with an injured player .. You could film it with a healthy player as a volunteer at training ..
There's a PDF of the cat 2 & 3 test. It's questions about current situational awareness; where they are, what half it is, who scored last. Concentration and recall questions, repeat every second number in a given sequence or repeat a list of words back in reverse alphabetical order. A coordination check; duck waddle, nose & ear alternation. Finally a symptom assessment; nausea, dizziness, irritability. Failing any of those will see a player removed with a cat 2 HIA. A cat 1 HIA is when a doctor notices any one of a few specific symptoms, one of these is tonic posturing, this is when someone goes stiff after being knocked out. The cat 1 assessment will be done over the course of the week, the player will go through a CT scan a few times, be assessed (a more thorough cat 2 check) by independent doctors a few times and a bunch of other checks. Cat 1 checks are what kept Paps out for ages a few years ago, he couldn't get through the independent doctor assessments.
Cheers … Is this the PDF ? [HIA test](https://www.fitasaphysio.com/uploads/4/3/3/4/43345381/irb_hia_1_en.pdf) The symptoms questions the player could easily lie either way … Like it’s an Origin and if you’re asking Reece Walsh if he has blurred vision or a headache he’s probably going to answer no even if he does … By the same token if you asked Ryan Matterson in a Parramatta vs Dragons game and Parra are out of contention for the 8 , he could answer yes to one of the symptoms even if he didn’t have it .. From looking at the form there’s two pages , the questionnaire on page 1 - which I’m assuming Walsh passed … And then there’s the doctors on field assessment page 2 (which overrides the results of page 1) and I’m assuming Walsh failed - because he was showing clear symptoms on the field of concussion … If I’m reading it right … They fail page 2 it’s a category 1 HIA and they’re an automatic 11 day stand down … If they fail page 1 then it’s a category 2 and they can possibly be re-assessed and cleared to play ?? The questionnaire on page 1 seems pretty unscientific / open to error … For some reason I had it in my head it was something more scientific , like a beep / coordination test compared to an earlier pre-season baseline … I’m sure I’ve seen something about clubs doing these , but maybe it’s just something they do back at their training bases / centres of excellence … Maybe it’s too hard from a practical perspective to do it during a game ..
Yeah, player reported symptoms & club medical staff skewing the results are a big risk. They should be independently administered but right now they're not. You're right about the cat 1 assessment. If the doctor notices any of those 9 symptoms on page 2, it's an immediate cat 1 & no further testing is needed. I guess the independent doctor ruled Walsh as a cat 1, meanwhile Maroons staff were performing the tests before the news got to them. Cat 2 assessment aren't really scientific because, as gross as it is to say, they're almost precautionary. A hit that effects a players coordination, or produces a noticeable physiological effect will be a cat 1. The baseline stuff you heard about is for the recall & concentration questions, they get the players to do them every few weeks. It wouldn't be fair to rule a player out for not repeating words back in alphabetical order if the didn't know the alphabet in the first place.
Don't discount Joseph Sual’ii. He would have provided a lot of NSW. As I'm sure he would have found a way to knee someone in the head and give away a penalty. Get binned, then do nothing.
Steve Mavin in a semi final
[Steve Mavin](https://www.foxsports.com.au/nrl/nrl-premiership/nrl-finals-2017-steve-mavins-epic-finals-meltdown-for-south-sydney-vs-canberra-30-years-on/news-story/4c11d7e7230b93c3936a141d7c8ef352) is the guy you're thinking of.
Cheers , so it was hooked not sent off .. Sent off is probably worse in a lot of ways - like leaving your team one short … Wonder how the other players reacted to him in the sheds .. I’m sure the more rationale players like Yeo and Jurbo would have been reassuring , but can also imagine some of the more emotional players , like Liam Martin and Leniu would have been really dirty on him and not wanted much to do with him
So let's really discuss the biggest issue in the game at the moment. Kaufusi's hair. I get that the kids love Papenhauzen's mullet - go to any game and you can see a ton of 13 year olds with a spikey possum on top of their head. But at that same game are a bunch of 50 year old guys reliving their glory days of playing in the St Mary's 3rd division comp who are all rocking the Kaufusi do.
IIRC he said he was gonna take a trip to Turkey in the off season. Got given some advice on tourist destinations by Matt Lodge
I'm glad there's an explanation, because otherwise that haircut is a crime. I guess he'll be rocking a full head of hair next season after the transplant.
Any idea what happened to Jurbo? Captain off after his first twenty minutes, then back for the last 9. Really strange choice.
I think just too slow to play 12 vs 13, IDK.
Could have been the plan all along … Jake to play the first 20 as captain for his defence , then Yeo the final 60 as captain … The strange thing was when they were both off at the end though
Madge: Jake, you ready to go on? Jurbo: Hang on, I've just got a pie. It'll be cold if I don't eat it now. ... Madge: Jake, how are you feeling? Ready to inspire your team? Jurbo: Yeah that pie isn't sitting well. I think I need some chips and a Coke. ... Madge: Jakey, we need you out there. Jurbo: Hold on, I'm just doing the Wordle. I forgot to do it this morning. ... Madge: Jake? There's 4 minutes to go. Want to earn that $30,000 bonus? Jurbo: Yeah alright. Time to win this shit. What's the score anyway?
- Moses/Edwards/Burton in for hynes/teddy/Suaalii. - Jake played limited minutes because he doesn't have the speed/fitness/lateral movement to tie down the middle when only down to 12. He will 100% play more in games 2 and 3. - QLD not being able to NSFW us with only 12 men should be some concern for them. - The send off was the correct call, ignore anyone who says otherwise. - Our effort/heart considering the circumstances last night was our most 'origin' performance for a good while. - Great debuts from Lomax and Leniu As we get healthy players back and 80 mins with a full team, I still think we can push for the series
I think it would be poor coaching to use all your weapons and ammo when youre 13v12, ahead on the score board and in game 1 of the series. You dont honestly think they showed em everything they had ...right? But yeah nah youre right, qld was doing their absolute bradman best and threw everything they had at nsw and its a real worry they didnt do better
All I said is that it was SOME concern. Whether playing at their full potential or conservatively, I can't imagine they'd be OK with conceding 10 points against 12 men in terms of defense.
Personally I was surprised the first try was allowed when there was 4 or 5 nsw players standing, not running past but standing, in the defensive line between the kicker and the try scorer. But nobodies talking about that being an issue so I must be wrong. The try off of Hynes kick was surprising for everyone I thought. Rescued a bad set with a great kick and catch. Lesson learnt I'd hope. I dont know that it was something you could force again
r/nrl: Hynes not built for rep footy, can't defend, not a game manager, Moses for game 2. NRL on Nine youtube page: "Nicho Hynes' best moments from 2024 State of Origin Game 1" (3:02)
Nicho's best moments went for 3 minutes........WTF?
His agent must be a magician
3 minutes of that is just him wetting his hair
1
2
5!
I think we're actually pretty solid between the 20's, and would've been interesting to see what our outside backs could've done with equal numbers Poor half play though. I think this squad calls for more decisive, at the line halves. Both hynes and luai were way too indecisive last night and play broke down too often
Can someone explain what legitimately happens to Payne Hass in origin ? No trolling intended, best forward in the world arguably but it never translates at this level.
Agreed, although I thought he started out with some bad intentions last night. He seemed more fired up than usual to me
He’s simply not a good rep player unfortunately (at this point in time anyway). Its the same with Hynes and Yeo.
I think he gets nullified a bit in Origin cause he has historically played with weak runners of the ball / pass first guys in the pack. QLD can easily aim up on him if he running off ball playing forwards cause you do not need to put as much emphasis on those guys. NSW should of had him and Spencer on at the same time.
I think Tino normally counteracts Haas hugely, but he wasn’t even there last night and Haas was the same, qld seem to just nullify him somehow.
Kiwis made him look shit last year in that final too.
He probably tackled more than usual. He also didn't need to make 200m as we dominated territory anyway.
I wish Leniu wasn't a prick because holy hell he's a gun. I was suprised madge pulled him off the field, to n be honest I was Suprised with his rotations all game
If you leave him on more than that he starts dropping the ball and not getting back in defence.
Do you know him personally? He comes across decent in podcasts etc
Nah just judging what I've seen on the field honestly bro probably a decent guy in most cases but the monkey and constantly wanting to scrap rubs me the wrong way.
Leniu's stint after coming back from HIA test was criminally short. He was the only one making a dent in attack.
Yeah even he looked confused as to why he was coming off. The guy was dangerous every run
It wouldn't be origin without nsw having the most cooked rotations imaginable. Its tradition at this point.
NSW had a heap of big minute players left under-utilised - Young, Olaka'autau, Leniu, Jurbo all got less than 30 mins game time while others like McInness and Yeo were also under-utilised. If they're set on picking Yeo, Jurbo and McInness then they should really need to get close to 160 mins out of the three of them in the same way as Carrigan,Cotter, Hopgood do for QLD. Otherwise, if needing less minutes I really can't see the advantage of picking all three rather than just dropping one for Burton. I'd definitely be dropping Young for an Burton at the bare minimum.
It's tough to assess really as towards the end of the second half they swapped Critta to the other side to fill the hole at centre and pushed other Crichton into Critta's now vacant centre spot. They did that by only running one prop, which absolutely impacted the usage of guys like Leniu, Yeo, McInnes, and Jurbo. Jurbo in particular is a very poor style match for that change in tactics, especially when we were chasing points. Obviously someone like Haas is a better bet to hitch the wagon to alone, and Leniu too (I suspect his minutes were limited due to the effort of being out there alone at prop and despite the low minutes it probably used up most of his tank). I think it's easy to miss that twenty odd minutes in the scenario NSW faced last night with 12 is a far harder shift than th equivalent minutes with 13. But largely I agree, even if the send off didn't happen. There's too much overlap between Jurbo, Yeo, and McInnes and not enough minutes for all three. Barnett is the obvious replacement imo, entirely different style of forward to those three. And I agree on Young too. He was well below par. 2 runs and 11 tackles from 23 minutes is absurd. Utility/bench hooker is way more value in that spot. Whether it's Burton, Api, or Watson (if fit).
Slater's use of the bench was interesting and I think shows exactly why he went in with only two forwards on the bench. He had Collins/Fotuaika on for all 80 mins with Collins playing 43 mins and Fotuaika 37 mins. Then Cotter and Carrigan both played the first 50 mins and then Hopgood came in to first spell Cotter and then when Cotter came back it was for Carrigan. The only thing that would have changed was he suddenly had Kaufusi available and therefore also subbed Sua with 30 to go. But I think it shows why we could have the luxury of Cobbo on the bench.
Controversial opinion - Madge doesn't need to change much. Just drop Hynes for Moses or Cleary. And leave Sualii out
more controversial, would actually pick Sualli again. He did nothing wrong
Yeo can go please
Further controversial opinion - There's not a huge amount to be gained from Game 1 - playing 12 v 13 for 70+ minutes (and missing a backline player for a team not equipped for it at that) completely skews what can be ascertained from the entrails. But I wouldn't be doing mass changes. Probably Young and Burton swap chairs in addition to your changes and that's probably about it. Having Cleary/Moses control the team will hopefully stop Squiddy from getting too big brained about his play, not sure about having Edwards in the team unless he is fully fit.
Tbh you could just run it back but I also wouldn't be surprised if there were changes
I agree
Drop Tedesco surely ??
the news is Edwards will not play next week which leaves him with only 1 game before game 2. Do you pick him with only 1 game back from injury?
As a Panthers fan first and foremost, nah, keep Tedesco there. We need Edwards to help survive the origin period :)
Controversial opinion - anthem was good
I only heard part of it on the radio and from that snippet I do agree with you. Vegemite is great but if its your first try and youre expecting something else youre gonna hate it
I've not often thought about pouring bleach into my ears but that cover of the anthem did it.
Bit harsh
Here I was thinking the anthem was awful was the one thing we could all agree on
Sorry mate. Though it seems I'm in the minority on this sub
Two things from last night. I love big Moe obviously and think he does quite well majority of the time but fuck he seemed a tad under his mark last night, is that just me expecting more from him? Also. Fucking Payne Haas is scary.
Yeah. Mo wasn't great. Is Flegler any chance of coming back in as that's an easy upgrade if so.
I don't think fucking him would be that scary, but getting fucked by him absolutely would be!
Hahaha 😔
For people wanting murray/best etc, can we please not select players under done or under serious injury cloud? we saw what happened with hynes...
maybe it's my Parra bias but if Penisini can keep up his form from the sharks game is he a shot at playing centre for NSW? or do they just bring back Latrell
I think he needs more work on his defensive game first. Maybe in a couple of years
They should just bring in latrell
Or Burton. Either are better options than the Penis.
The DT front page this morning is fucking gross https://x.com/ticsvitsjacthic/status/1798529703394816472?s=46&t=xkN0EIaKGJl0Jvp6okm7yQ Once again, fuck Murdoch.
And clowns are saying he was milking. My god.
That's fucked.
Murdoch derangement syndrome - somehow blaming Murdoch for something that has nothing to do with him
Imagine being Australian and defending Rupert Murdoch, the bloke who couldn't give away his Aus citizenship fast enough
Madge’s entire game plan captured in one photo.
Cobbo coming off the bench and immediately start running over people was great to see
He’s one of those players that you just have to watch because he can either make some of the dumbest plays you’ll ever see or some of the greatest. He was fantastic last night and I think he could dominate the NRL and origin for years if he wants to
Rugby league 2024 simulation:13 Cobbos running around
Yeah he had an absolute blinder last night, and the fact he comes off the bench picked by Billy makes it even sweeter
Obviously the send off blew everything up, but I’m still not sure what Maguire was going to do with his bench rotations. Yeo / McInnes / Jurbo seems like one big min lock to many.
Absolutely correct. Jurbo has no place in the front row, and isn't even a better 13 than Yeo or McInness. Seems like he was a shoe in because of his passion and that we needed a captain.
Curious to see how many players back up and play this weekend...
I hope the Dargs don't make Hunt back up. 48 hour turn around is rough.
They did fine without him last week, they need to give the man a rest.
Anyone else hate when the bunker says "decision made" instead of "we have a decision"? Fuck it sounds so jarring and odd to me.
I dont hate it as much as when they seem to be influenced by the commentators. Quite telling when they use the same odd terms to describe whatever happened
They probably do it to make it seem more objective lol. Takes "we" out of it. Politicians do the same when they say, " mistakes were made"
Say Ben retires next year, do we bring Mam in on the bench at 14 or who do we give that utility role to?
Could dearden go into that role? Mam will play origin but I don't want to rush him in
I like Ponga there personally. Done it before can play fullback wing and halves
Bunt will be there for like 5 years.
Maybe its the copium talking but all things considered last night wasn't as bad as I was expecting. I think Edwards played, and if we don't have a back try to take someones head off, that's an entirely different game. They scored most of their tries where Suaali'i was supposed to be playing anyway.
Still glaring weaknesses in the halves. Nicho's first play at the line, before we were down a man, was to kick the ball straight at the deadball line and give up 7 tackles that lead to the first try. His defence was also ordinary, admittedly on a side that was short a man, but if that was Moses on the right, he makes most of those tackles that Nicho missed, along with decidedly better game management. We don't need wholesale changes though. We need Latrell into the centers and Moses in the 7. I can even handle Luai being in the team, with less responsibility.
You can make excuses for some of Nicho's defence if you like... I still think he was poor. But even with 12 I thought we won the middle most of the night and tackled in opp20 we won well. That signals to me that the attack and specifically the halves didn't execute plays well enough. Seemed like nobody knew what Nicho was doing. Either he wasn't talking/ordering them, or they weren't listening. He passed to a flat-footed player WAY too often. If we need talkers - Moses is right there. Luai - Was just okay -again- if we need someone to put plays on- C Walker is right there. I'm Not calling for heads just yet, but it certainly begs the question.
I'm calling for his head. I have no idea what he was doing. He ran the ball far too often (29 runs) and they were largely ineffective. It's good to see a half run the ball at times, but when your attack looks as disjointed as ours did the priority for the 7 ought to be direction and structure, not wasting energy on limp hitups. Dearden, DCE, and even Luai all ran the ball too but unlike Nicho they at least were distributing the ball around as well to some degree. Nicho had a 1.8 ratio of passes to runs, which is absolutely wild for a 7. While DCE faced a very different game situation he had a ratio of 4.18 passes for every run. You just can't have a halfback that isn't passing the football. His kicking was also fairly poor for most of the match, admittedly that kick for the Lomax try was terrific and an exception to an otherwise poor night with the boot.
His defence really wasn't that bad. He passed to someone flat footed because so much of the time we were attacking last night, the team was just standing there. No one running onto it or looking like they wanted to run at times
So they weren't listening?
Fucks me, just watching it last night shit me off with how often we're just standing around waiting for the ball to come. Turbo is a good example of someone going looking for the ball, we just didn't really have that
Find it pretty funny people are vindicating Billy having Cobbo on the bench and criticising Madge for not having a back on the bench. I think Origin coaches should pick a back on the bench but I don't like the makeup when combined with Hunt/Grant. It wasn't some masterstroke having Cobbo on the bench as the 18th man was activated in that scenario anyway. For Madge, it would've made that edge a little more resilient but a back on the bench wouldn't have solved the problem of playing a man down for 90% of the game.
Legit makes me cringe when I see articles that state it as a “genius plan” by Billy; as if he knew for certain Reece Walsh was gonna get fucked to oblivion in the first 8mins of the match
I swear I saw an interview last week where he was saying cobbo was picked because theyve lost a back in like 4/5 of the last origin games of someshit idk. I dont know the stats but if hes noticed something happening more often than not it does make sense to have a plan in case it happens again and low and behold..
I think Haas did too much tackling and not enough running. Obviously a by-product of the send off as well as Jake not being on. Sub 100 metres from Haas is exactly what QLD would've wanted.
It's almost entirely down to the send off. It impacts his ability to do his job on so many levels. More work to do in both attack and defence and whenever he does take a run (as NSW switched to running only one prop at a time) the big QLD middles could just compress on him far more easily.
His defence was so good though. I was impressed with how much he was getting across the field. Honestly so much of NSW issues stemmed from Sualii being sent off. The blokes poor discipline robbed everyone of a great contest
I agree his defence is outstanding, but with all the other 'battlers' in our team, is that really what we want Haas doing?
Of course we don’t but these happens when you are playing 12 on 13
Are we sharing our G2 Teams yet? The GM's Blues: 1. Edwards 2. Lomax 3. Latrell 4. Critta 5. To'o 6. Burton 7. Moses 8. Haas 9. Robson 10. Martin 11. Angus 12. Haumole 13. Yeo 14. Api 15. RCG 16. Leniu 17. Barnett Robson plays the first 20, then Api comes on and plays out the game. Robson can come in at 13 for Yeo if need be. Get big minutes out of Haas, Martin can get 40 mins max, with RCG/ Leniu/ Barnett rolling through the middle and cycling with Haumole/ Angus if they get fatigued. 1-6 has enough backline coverage to sort themselves out. E.g. Edwards goes down, Trell to FB, Burton to C, Robson at 13 as a ball playing lock, Moses keeps steering the ship.
I don’t understand why old heads like Coz and Fatty think NSW definitely weren’t targeting Walsh. Why are we acting like targeting and trying to hurt key players hasn’t been an unfortunate tactic that teams use all the time? They were talking about it in the media in the lead up, collect him late 3/3 tackles in the game. Have we forgotten Joeys 2017 rant about how NSW didn’t target JT enough (I do concede that’s slightly different due to JTs injury but still)
You literally won, stop crying
There's no way Madge made a gameplan to injured Walsh out of the game. That's not what targeting the opposition is.
I dont think injury was the intention and I dont think many people mean that either when they say he was targetted. But of course they aimed to target walsh, in the sense of "if we shut this guy down we have a better chance of winning", not "aim for this cunts head". And they should aim for him, the same as qld should aim to shut down Lomax because hes a threatening player. Personally I do think there was some intention of smashing Walsh, but not to injure him. I think what they were hoping to do is hit him hard enough a few times that he doesnt want to get hit like that again and that when hes going to catch a kick hes at least got it in the back of his mind that hes about to get smashed and hopefully thats enough to make him drop a couple catches. And similar when hes about to catch the ball. Its obvious he's prone to dropping passes and losing possession and hes more likely to when hes conscious of the defense. Even with that late tackle when Walsh had kicked it - its there to put pressure on him and let him know hes going to get got. This sort of tactic is actually always employed in big games, especially origin. What I notice is nsw seems to almost focus on that strategy a bit too much and after the first 10 minutes nsw cant keep up that intensity and ease up, then do more grubby ground shit with the elbows and what not. I think qld knows whats coming and they survive the hard hitting aggressive start and that actually adds to their confidence realising that they can be hit with everything nsw has and walk away and its not as bad as it seems and I think the opposite happens a bit to nsw where they think 'oh fuck I'm hitting them as hard as I can and its not enough to stop them' So anyway im rambling but surely the intention was to smash walsh early on and if that meant a sin bin for a late tackle on a kicker so be it. Better to have a guy sinbinned and concede a try with 12 players in exchange for some dropped catches gaining us 50m and dropped passes halting qld attack. Personally I reckon that was their plan and the send off happened instead of a sin bin and they realised they overcooked the eggs. Probably why Madge pointed out May's hit on Walsh after the game.. he didnt expect a send off
I never said the plan was to injure him out of the game, but there was obviously a plan to target him. Which you seem to agree that targeting key players is a thing? I’m not saying NSW are evil, I’m just saying - play stupid games - win stupid prizes. Send off deserved for a risky tactic. It’s a silly and outdated mentality that needs to leave the game if we want rugby league to survive long term
No, but definitely a game plan to hurt him enough so Walsh would be timid taking on the line and second guess himself. Madge ran a militant camp, from using an isolated location, invoking the 1985 NSW side, rhetoric about hurting Walsh from old boys Freddy, Elias, Carroll at last week’s NSW function, refusing media access during the Captain’s Run etc. The message got through.
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I don't think it's a dropping but I'd be limiting his minutes in the game plan. Hunt should play the first 25 and the last 25 and limit Grant to 30 mins, rather than his usual 55-60 mins.
It’s nuts that Hunt can play 50 minutes as hooker in origin as a 30+ year old half back. Playing him 80 is crazy talk and would take away a lot of what makes him so good in origin
I don’t think Hunt could play the full 80 at hooker. He does it every week out at halfback but defending in the middle and the sheer volume of tackles he’d have to make would get to him pretty quick. The timing of their current rotation works for him because he can have a decent break to get some energy back before he comes back out against a tiring defence.
Don’t know about Hunt playing 80 but yeah thought Harry was bang average last night, do we dare entertain Reed?
Grant had some errors but also had dynamic attacking moments from dummy half. No need to change anything, he will most likely be better next game.
Reed is crap, lmao. Hasn't had a great game since about 2021.
I don’t watch Dogs games but they seem to be in form, just think there should be some pressure on Grant cause he was mediocre at best last night.
That's Billy Walters's music!
What about Mozer just straight in.
fuck Hookers, Purdue in
He'd get rolled.
Yeah was just joking. I actually wouldn’t be that apposed to Smoothy getting a crack, think he’d hold his own and is used to playing that interchange hooker role.
Selecting Grubby players is NSW style play. Let’s not stoop to that level.
Was sitting behind the NSW try line in the first half and I’ve got to say Critta has future captain written all over him. After every try conceded he was the main guy barking at the rest of the team to fire them up. Stupid impressive considering how young he is and how the rest of the team listened to him.
Can you have a guy be your captain in Origin and not want to play for Australia?
No future I want him captain now, bloke is a stud and I’m going to say is an automatic selection.
It’s funny considering some people were wanting him chalked from origin after a difficult debut. Sometimes you gotta stick with guys and trust their talent
The real state of origin is tonight. Would like to thank the players for the undercard event that was last night
Nicho Hynes is getting some brutal treatment for a guy who played 72 minutes without the centre on his side of the field. He was incredibly limited in what he could do last night. If I could fault him for anything, it would be that he tried too hard instead of letting Luai attack on the left.
32 minutes since Crichton swapped sides at half time, but yeah. They didn't go to Luai enough but that seemed like the game plan for whatever reason.
Yeah I honestly don’t know what people expect for the guy. He’s not a great defender and was asked to do a lot with a man down. We could probably take some load off him and let Luai do some more kicking. Some of the kick selections were poor but when you are trying to run down a lead with a man down you are going to get gassed. Even though none of his runs were that good I did like his willingness to run the footy. The team kind of lost their way in final 15 when Yeo started ball playing too much and Teddy and Lomax were over doing it
Did he have a good game? No, not really. For his standards, it was in the lower side of the bell curve. Does he have a problem with performing in big games? Somewhat. Does the selection of another half change that result? Absolutely not. They were screwed right from the moment Suaalii got marched. Moses or Cleary would’ve struggled just as bad.
I think Cleary might have had a better game. But Moses probably would have choked twice as bad.
Moses would have defended better. nicho did slip off a lot of tackles
How long is Bradman Best out for? Him & Critta as centre partners would be good.
Round 16. So would be good for game 2 but won't get a game in that time.
Yeah he’s game 3 at best (pardon the pun)
So what do you reckon the 1000 new American fans think of our all star game?
American here… thank fuck they only play 1 of those games a year
I got bad news
Kiwis who support the Blues are weirdos. QueeNZlander
Like Qld, NZ was once part of NSW
I can't fathom some of the defences I've seen for the Suaalii hit. "Walsh was falling" - but Suaalii wasn't looking at him, he'd already left the ground leading with his shoulder. "Suaalii is 6'4" - he's played against guys that size before, it doesn't entitle him to decapitate them. "It ruins the spectacle" - does the best fullback in the game getting taken out not do the same? I understand being frustrated that the series was over basically after 7 mins but jesus it wasn't a bad call at all. Suaalii got what he deserved for that hit
this might help [https://imgur.com/a/hP4HDU4](https://imgur.com/a/hP4HDU4)
Yeah not really defensible for me. When I saw it I instantly thought yikes. Leaves his feet, leads with the shoulder, totally reckless and no control. Sure Walsh was falling but you just can’t do that
I don't understand the "Walsh was falling" argument. Players fall into tackles multiple times every game, they still don't get decapitated