When I was watching QLD play, with such dynamic players (Ponga, Munster, Walker and Grant). I wonder if we need to **** off the link forward like they did. Ponga was mainly the link.
Just use Walsh as the link man and let him control the whole left side by himself linking with Piakura/Grant/Karapani.
While Reyno/Duffy sit in the middle of field to put up kicks if we stretch the field one side with Mam on left or right side of our halfback as a short pass option if the kick isn't on.
Basically, shift Patty and X to prop. So you'd have Patty / Haas start with Priki / X coming off the bench.
11,12 and 13 will be defensive minded and making the hard carries when needed. JRiki/Piakura as 2nd row. And use a 3-interchange lock/2nd row rotation. Rogers > Talty/Francis (he played really well in U19 origin) > Semu going hard as they can at "lock" for 20 or so minutes and JGos as 2R backup if JRiki/Piakura are gassed.
That way our backrow can lead line speed and focus on keeping our ruck tidy in defense.
Basically, trying to simplify our attack to "less cooks in the kitchen" and fast PTB AND fixing our forward pack "glue". It just falls apart once the opposition gets the slightest ruck speed.
Just food for thought. As I said in previous games, we have no structure or rotation that we can rely on.
The link man in the middle is a weird one... it's so prevalent across the league that it's become very obvious when they're passing and it just seems to slow shit down if defence decides to cheat up on it and just go straight to the backline.
I'm not a huge fan of it and I'm surprised it's still a part of the meta, but I think the issue is that the middle forward doesn't become enough of a threat... they need to be hitting that short man more often to put the defence in two minds.
It becomes very obvious when the link man is going out the back and just gives the defence time to slide off.
I think the bigger issue comes from splitting the halves left and right, but then the defence can just follow where the fullback is going, because he's the only one with freedom to roam both sides.
Storm have never gone with the ball playing lock... they might've gone their closest in recent years with Loiero, but I don't think he's much of a ball player... he's just pure link man.
One thing that makes storm's attack so good when it's going is they have almost a diamond shape at the ruck
Dummy half as the point of the diamond, a half at first receiver either side and then fullback behind the dummy half.
From there they can do a fair bit, but quite often it will be half passing to half instead of link man to half... if shit's going down in the attack it's basically hooker > half > half > fullback.
All 4 members of the spine and everyone else just running lines around them, but acting as legitimate options ready to receive it.
I'm surprised more teams haven't gone that route because it basically forces your best players (the spine) to be touching the ball as often as possible.
It also becomes harder for the defence to pick up the fullback if he leaves his movement late... or if the halves and fullback are moving either side of the ruck all the time.
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