You were onto something Splinter.
Missed large chunks of the game, this is what I gathered...
First half
I arrived just as the boys were lining up for the second conversion. Then I believe we scored again off the next set or just a little while after that. It was actually pretty scrappy play. Kodi threw one hospital pass, then a nice pass to Ofahengaue and off the play the ball, Jayden just scurried over the line.
Parra had a chance to hit back but some very desperate defence on our line saved the day. I believe it may have been Drew or Opacic who came up with a pearler on Davis before the boys covered the offload.
To end the half, I believe we defused one of their cross-field kicks.
Anyways, went for a bit of a hike and came back with about 16 to play. Parra just scored on the fringes with the weight of possession to make it 24-18. Then they scored off the scrum after Byrnes dropped a Dockar-Clay bomb. I turned to my mate and said that number two is going to score, the Broncos were clearly out-numbered and he had a ton of space. So Matterson drifts out draws a few would be defenders and Goodall scores without a hand being touched on him.
Genius! 24-22.
Then it was like I was being treated to a preview of tonight's game. Brisbane had opportunity after opportunity to close the game out...but kept going themselves and turned it over. The Nikorimas were the worst offenders, dead-set would have a massive overlap and they would want to put some foot-work on and play touch football. The worst example was with about 10 to go and the Broncos had a two man overlap and Nikorima decided to put in a grubber kick right to the Parra player. It's lessons like these they'll need to learn.
Fortunately, Parra couldn't find an answer long enough and I thought a bunch of our players really pulled through when we needed them to. Drew came up with a great break which put us in nice attacking position, I believe it was Arrow (couldn't see a number) who made a nice surge that left a Parra player laying. That was sort of unfortunate, but the run was very timely, and that gave us opportunities we otherwise probably shouldn't have had.
Sadly, Parra could only be kept scoreless for so long and once again, Matterson drew a few in, went out to Goodall who made a nice break before linking back inside to Davis to score what was the match winner.
A tough lesson for the boys, but one they'll learn from.
Couple of other observations
- Adams is still a fairly handy player, lays on nice big hits and can make some good surges on the fringe.
- Byrnes was tested a lot and it's a shame he came up with that one bad blue because he was very safe from what I saw.
- Barr impressed me off the bench, couple of nice surges through the middle
- Alick appears to be too slow for the wing...
- I'm mixed on Berrell. He's a good competitive player and picks his runs nicely (most times, couple near the line which were very silly) but his passing game is very weird.
Wish I could provide a more comprehensive report, but sadly got a little sidetracked.