Finals Week 2

If the Raiders win this it will be a very entertaining GF qualifier between them and the Storm. The Raiders play a very entertaining brand of football and they are very capable of beating the Storm.
 
Congratulations to the Raiders on making their first preliminary final in 19 years. They were the better team overral tonight and weathered the difficult periods to come out on top. They still make some mistakes that let their opponents back in but they are capable of beating Melbourne in Melbourne.
 
I'd give the Raiders as good a chance as anyone to beat the Storm. Their style of play makes them one a few teams that can take it to the Storm.

I'm going to be a Raiders fanboy till the end of the year, up up the Raiders!!

I couldn't handle the grubby Sharks/Gallen, the cheating wrestlers or the Cows going back to back.

If the Raiders do get knocked out though, I'll hope whoever wins the GF gets their titled stripped due to some interchange controversy or something.
 
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Odd game.

As expected, when the Panthers were confronted with a team capable of scoring points they looked vulnerable and directionless. It's easy to put a battered and bruised team to the sword and play enterprising football, it's difficult to do it when the opposition is ready to play.

Meanwhile the return of Blake Austin added a lot to the Raiders tonight. Williams & Sezer are very similar players, their halves pairing robbed the Raiders of the potency and structure that got them to the dance. Austin's running game troubled the Panthers gave and provided more space for Leilua & Rapana who were more involved than they were the week before.

Once again, the Raiders started the game like a house on fire. If they can establish a similar start against Melbourne and convert it into points we could have a boil over on our hands and a far more entertaining grand final in the making. However, I don't expect the Storm to roll over like the Panthers did. It took Penrith until the 55th minute to get into the game and by that stage the pressure got to them.

I also don't expect the Raiders to receive the majority of the home-town calls either. There were a few instances where the Panthers were hard done by and it's really frustrating to see.
 
Speaking of Penrith...

As promising as their future appears, they're in an awkward position heading into 2017. By rights, they should be a Top 4 side, there really isn't an excuse for them to improve when you consider the make-up of the side next year.

For reference...

1. Matt Moylan 2. Josh Mansour 3. Dean Whare 4. Peta Hiku 5. Dallin Watene-Zelezniak
6. Te Maire Martin 7. Nathan Cleary
8. Lelani Latu 9. Peter Wallace 10. James Tamou 11. Bryce Cartwright 12. Isaah Yeo 13. Trent Merrin
14. Tyrone Peachey 15. Chris Grevsmuhl 16. Tim Browne 17. Reagan Campbell-Gillard

You may have already spotted the problem, but if not, they've got too many cooks in the kitchen and not enough hands. Meaning with Moylan, Martin, Cleary, Wallace, Cartwright and Peachey as play-makers they made struggle in the ruck and lose the arm wrestle. They may also find themselves chopping and changing their roster, trying to figure out the right combinations for the players involved. It isn't the worst problem to have and they should still make the Top 8 but I don't think it's a guarantee that this 'young' team will improve in 2017. It maybe in 2018-19 we see what the Panthers are capable of.
 
Raiders still continue to shoot themselves in the foot.

They will need to fix that very quickly because they can't do the same next week and win against Melbourne.

I liked the Panthers fight. They came close to leveling the scores but as BP said before, the pressure got to them. They were throwing passes that didn't need to be thrown, making too many silly mistakes.

If they played with a bit more patience and applied more pressure instead of trying to score off every play, they could have come away with a win. They were getting the field position, Raiders were struggling to get out of their half.. But a few boneheaded mistakes and a couple of questionable calls from Cummins got Raiders back in it and they took it beyond reach.

The future is exciting for the Panthers, though. They have some very talented youngsters and they are building quite a nice spine. They need to do some more recruiting, but they look to be on the up.
 
The Raiders might just be the side that can trouble the Storm, much the same as we did when we beat them late in the season.
 
The Raiders might just be the side that can trouble the Storm, much the same as we did when we beat them late in the season.

Yeah, I think so too. Storm love getting sides into an armwrestle, and they win from there because they are the best at it. Raiders like to play attacking footy which is pretty much the opposite of what the Storm want. It is much the same as when we beat them last time.
 
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