OPINION Looking towards 2024

[Foordy]

So with the season over, it's time to look towards the 2024 season.

As much as I love Herbie, I think we should be able to cover him much more easily than Flegs. With Flegs going I fear we are one big, aggressive, skillful forward short, hopefully Willison or Te Kura can fill that role.

I'd move Cobbo to centre although, we'll have our work but out teaching him the defensive side of the position.

I'd be moving Patty to prop, with Capes to move to the lock position (IMO, his best games this year have been when he's been in the middle)

I hear the calls to start Kobe at lock, but I respectfully disagree, I feel he is a weapon off the bench, he lifts the intensity with both his runs and defence, the bench is where he offers us his best value.

I'd also start giving Mozer some bench time.

I really can't decide on two bench forward positions so whoever performs best during the trials to take them

So Foordys 2024, round 1 team is:

1. Walsh
2. Mariner/Oates
3. Cobbo
4. Staggs
5. Arthars
6. Mam
7. Reynolds
8. Carrigan
9. Walters
10. Haas
11. Piakura
12. Riki
13. Capewell

14. Mozer
15. Jensen / Baker/ Willison
16. Jensen / Baker/ Willison
17. Hetherington

 

[Sproj]

Interesting that as far as I am aware, Smoothy and Oates are still not signed on for next year.

 

[Nashy]

Over the years I've noticed that BHQ will back juniors who turn out to be useless.

I don't think I'll have confidence that we can replace these two, until we see some of these players actually playing NRL.

QCup is not NRL and being a good player in a dud comp means very little in the reality.

Cobbo will make a good centre, and with another year under his belt, will hopefully see him shine.

Flegs will be a tough replacement. That forward pack is a hell of a unit.

Injuries. A lot of luck in this department. For **** sake extend every contract in the conditioning team.

 

[winslow_wong]

not sure what our wing depth will be next season but is it wild to entertain the idea of preparing Oates to be a bench forward? He can come on in short bursts for impact. We know he can put on a hit and eat metres. But Something we still don’t have in our attack is that line running backrower on the edges. Oates has shown in small glimpses he can do that over the years.

Of course this all depends if he stays at the club.

 

[Culhwch]

So with the season over, it's time to look towards the 2024 season.

As much as I love Herbie, I think we should be able to cover him much more easily than Flegs. With Flegs going I fear we are one big, aggressive, skillful forward short, hopefully Willison or Te Kura can fill that role.

I'd move Cobbo to centre although, we'll have our work but out teaching him the defensive side of the position.

I'd be moving Patty to prop, with Capes to move to the lock position (IMO, his best games this year have been when he's been in the middle)

I hear the calls to start Kobe at lock, but I respectfully disagree, I feel he is a weapon off the bench, he lifts the intensity with both his runs and defence, the bench is where he offers us his best value.

I'd also start giving Mozer some bench time.

I really can't decide on two bench forward positions so whoever performs best during the trials to take them

So Foordys 2024, round 1 team is:

1. Walsh
2. Mariner/Oates
3. Cobbo
4. Staggs
5. Arthars
6. Mam
7. Reynolds
8. Carrigan
9. Walters
10. Haas
11. Piakura
12. Riki
13. Capewell

14. Mozer
15. Jensen / Baker/ Willison
16. Jensen / Baker/ Willison
17. Hetherington

I'd put Cobbo inside Arthars. Jesse is a pretty solid defender who doesn't make too many mistakes - he should be able to help Selwyn transition there.

 

[Nerd]

Interesting that as far as I am aware, Smoothy and Oates are still not signed on for next year.

That's a worry on Smoothy. Mozer is at least a season away from being a regular NRL player. With the way Arthurs is playing Oates would now be regarded as an injury back up type player.

 

[Mitchell_Broncos]

Who thinks we can make it this far next year again?

 

[Mitchell_Broncos]

Herbie is a massive loss the way he Carrie’s the ball back with grunt and breaks tackles easily is gonna be a big loss. Last person I’ve seen break tackles so easily was jimmy Roberts.

 

[winslow_wong]

Herbie is a massive loss the way he Carrie’s the ball back with grunt and breaks tackles easily is gonna be a big loss. Last person I’ve seen break tackles so easily was jimmy Roberts.

I think cobbo can fill that void if he gets his fitness up.

 

[Nashy]

I think cobbo can fill that void if he gets his fitness up.

If his attitude is right, he's almost built for it.

 

[Sproj]

Who thinks we can make it this far next year again?

Me, absolutely me. I think it comes to our coaching staff and after this year, I have full confidence in them. As long as they realise whoever replaces Flegs, Herbie and Keenan are not Flegs, Herbie and Keenan and coach the team to the new set of strengths, we'll be fine.

 

[Super Freak]

We can fill some of the void of Flegler leaving by putting Patty at prop and finally moving Kobe to lock where he belongs.

 

[Xzei]

wouldnt be shocked to see jensen back in the starting 13 next year mariner in for herbie either on cobbos wing or in the center position vacated by herbie,bench will be a bit of a shoot out between tapau, fletcher-baker and willison id imagine.

going to be a really interesting offseason

 

[Nashy]

We can fill some of the void of Flegler leaving by putting at prop and finally moving Kobe to lock where he belongs.

You mean move Patty to prop?

 

[Fitzy]

I just can’t wait to see what Ezra does off the back of tonight next season. Nothing short of fucken incredible. INCREDIBLE.

Walshy needs to go to that next level in my opinion as part of his progression that will be in the form of less errors and less unwanted headlines.

Carrigan and Haas got to keep on doing what they do best.

Jordan well fucken done man. He was the one who was going to have to make way or change positions before a ball was kicked this year and now he is the undisputed No.1 SR in this team.

Herbie and Flegs will be big losses but losses we can cover if we keep following our natural line of progression.

Huge shout out to Keenan as well. For years now he has been an incredible part of this team dynamic off the field and players like that are so valuable but this year you

1. Reece Walsh
2. Jesse Arthars
3. Kotoni Staggs
4. Deine Mariner
5. Selwyn Cobbo
6. Ezra Mam
7. Adam Reynolds
8. Corey Jensen
9. Billy Walters
10. Payne Haas
11. Jordan Riki
12. Brendan Piakura
13. Pat Carrigan
14. Blake Mozer
15. Kobe Hetherington
16. Xavier Willison
17. Kurt Capewell

For sure this team changes a little bit but wowsers. Still lots to love. I think if we get the same determination and natural progression in boys as this year we will win the comp next year. This second half of the season we have been near faultless. The Titans and last night was our only major blemish. We have improved so fucken much since the start of the year and hoping on the suspension and injury front we do well I can’t see many games we lose next year. Vegas is a nothing for me we have no time pressure to get over there and it’s a 12 hour flight back considering how good other side is as long as the NRL can read a room and don’t schedule a blockbuster for the next round we will be fine.

P.S. Selwyn and Deine could swap but I just think that right edge is perfect at the minute and I think Deine suits centre better than Wing. No doubt though Selwyn probably has one more year of tolerating wing before he decides he is better suited elsewhere either in centres or another club so it might be time to try a different dynamic early to alleviate the chances of that happening.

My prediction of the year is Xavier Willison goes to the next level as does Brendan making our forward pack even better than it already is.

 

[Super Freak]

You mean move Patty to prop?

Yeah Patty. Thought I typed that.

 

[Nashy]

Yeah Patty. Thought I typed that.

Don't like that. He's too good in his current position to move, the benefit just isn't there. What you gain from Hetherington being there, you lose from Patty leaving the position. He's arguably been the best player in the team for the entire year, he's gotta stay.

 

[Sproj]

I just can’t wait to see what Ezra does off the back of tonight next season. Nothing short of fucken incredible. INCREDIBLE.

Walshy needs to go to that next level in my opinion as part of his progression that will be in the form of less errors and less unwanted headlines.

Carrigan and Haas got to keep on doing what they do best.

Jordan well fucken done man. He was the one who was going to have to make way or change positions before a ball was kicked this year and now he is the undisputed No.1 SR in this team.

Herbie and Flegs will be big losses but losses we can cover if we keep following our natural line of progression.

Huge shout out to Keenan as well. For years now he has been an incredible part of this team dynamic off the field and players like that are so valuable but this year you

1. Reece Walsh
2. Jesse Arthars
3. Kotoni Staggs
4. Deine Mariner
5. Selwyn Cobbo
6. Ezra Mam
7. Adam Reynolds
8. Corey Jensen
9. Billy Walters
10. Payne Haas
11. Jordan Riki
12. Brendan Piakura
13. Pat Carrigan
14. Blake Mozer
15. Kobe Hetherington
16. Xavier Willison
17. Kurt Capewell

For sure this team changes a little bit but wowsers. Still lots to love. I think if we get the same determination and natural progression in boys as this year we will win the comp next year. This second half of the season we have been near faultless. The Titans and last night was our only major blemish. We have improved so fucken much since the start of the year and hoping on the suspension and injury front we do well I can’t see many games we lose next year. Vegas is a nothing for me we have no time pressure to get over there and it’s a 12 hour flight back considering how good other side is as long as the NRL can read a room and don’t schedule a blockbuster for the next round we will be fine.

P.S. Selwyn and Deine could swap but I just think that right edge is perfect at the minute and I think Deine suits centre better than Wing. No doubt though Selwyn probably has one more year of tolerating wing before he decides he is better suited elsewhere either in centres or another club so it might be time to try a different dynamic early to alleviate the chances of that happening.

My prediction of the year is Xavier Willison goes to the next level as does Brendan making our forward pack even better than it already is.

And it needs to be because the reality is, the thing that makes Cleary so good at club level but not as good at origin is that forward pack and back three. Penrith's pack and back three make so many metres and Cleary's kicking just pin the other team on their lines. Somehow you have to overcome that and we almost did. If we can get out three replacements for the guys leaving to somehow go to the same level as we did this year or 1% higher, I back our young spine and other young stars to go up enough to get the job done this time.