POST GAME Post Game Discussion - Round 1 - South Sydney

[Big Pete]

I agree about griffins cameo type use, but I don't think Bennetts "give the bench players as much time as the starters" way was any better. Theyre bench players for a reason, generally that reason is theyre not as good as the starters.

Mcguire should be playing 60+ minutes. We *always* lose forward momentum and our middle opens up when hes off. Parker is an 80 minute lock. Thaiday should be getting less than 40, yet he got 65. McCullough shouldn't be being subbed. If he cant play the 80 he should be told to find a new club.

It (Bennett's use of the bench) wasn't good in this case but I'm not going to crucify him over a Round 1 game and with a few tweaks it'll be better. I was just pleased with the intention as I'm sure a lot of people were.

I can't say I agree with your assessment of the Broncos time allocation. McGuire really isn't a good defender and is guilty of making soft efforts, especially as he gets fatigued. 40 minutes wasn't enough on Friday but he shouldn't be guaranteed time either.

Never understood the obsession with McCullough playing 80. Fair enough if you don't rate him but it just seems like it's another excuse to have a dig and most of us are sick of having the discussion.

 

[Foordy]

I don't think McCullough needs to play 80 mins ... unless you have a bench like we did on Thursday.

As good as Parker is he is not a hooker, hooker is a specialist position and i think playing a backrower there (even one as good as Parker) shows an under-estimation of the hooker position ... not to mention the massive weakening of our back row by taking Parker out of it.

 

[Big Pete]

If the game wasn't over at that point, McCullough doesn't come off.

 

[Morkel]

Walters was trying to justify the performance as "a couple of boys had a bad night", but mostly because we were playing the current Premiers. I really, really don't like that.

 

[Big Pete]

Why is that Morkel?

 

[rnabokov]

we don't necessarily need Macca to be playing 80 mins ... but if he is not capable of it, we need an actual hooker on the bench

I wonder for how many years we have debated the "2 hookers on the bench" issue. Almost as long as "The Effort was There" thread?

 

[Morkel]

Why is that Morkel?

That is a bullshit attitude. Not the "a few players had a bad game", I agree with that except it wasn't just Gavet, Blair or Thaiday as was mentioned at the time (Blair was one of the better ones IMO). But to write it off as "oh well, it's the premiers" is not what the Broncos was ever about. He should be fucking filthy that we dropped our bundle against the premiers. It wasn't even in context of "well, if you're playing the premiers everyone needs to bring their A game", it was a shrug of the shoulders and a defeatist attitude. Like, stop picking on them for losing so bad, it's the Rabbitohs. Whether it's to appease fans (and let's be honest, if a fan gives up on supporting because of one game, they're not fans) then IMO it's the wrong way to go about it, because it says that we should accept failure. Worse, expect failure unless everything goes 100% right. Especially since the Rabbitohs didn't play that well.

 

[Alec]

I agree, saying "Oh well, we got smashed by the premiers, it's alright" seems like massive beta approach from the coaching staff.

 

[Drop Bear]

I wonder for how many years we have debated the "2 hookers on the bench" issue. Almost as long as "The Effort was There" thread?

If you watched the Eels /Manly game last night, Peats and De Gois put up an answer to the two hooker question. Working off a big mobile pack, they had a field day at Manly's expense. Brad Arthur is bringing some exciting ideas into the game.

 

[Big Pete]

Yeah fair enough Morkel.

It doesn't really bother me because I know where they're coming from. They're being realistic about where the squad is at the moment and not trying to place them under too much pressure. There were enough good signs on Thursday to justify that attitude to me but they've got to make sure that Thursday was a once off.

 

[Broncoman]

Milford is the only reason they didn't add a nice wooden spoon to their trohy cabinet. Their team was terrible, is still terrible, yet his 2014 was still among the best of any player. That's what I'm getting at. You cant use the broncos team as an excuse for him not playing well when Canberra are worse and he stood out as one of the best in the nrl at them.

The Sharks also saved them with a horror year of their own but at least they had the excuse of the ASADA probe and their whole team being injured, but I agree with everything else.

Ricky is a master of luckily avoiding deserved wooden spoons.

 

[Morkel]

Not sure if this has been posted:

Sam Thaiday in firing line as Wayne Bennett swings the axe at Broncos

Two things about this:

"In an uncharacteristic display, Thaiday conceded three first-half penalties and risks being benched for the Cronulla clash after copping a half-time blast from Bennett."

Uncharacteristic display? Um, this has been a Thaiday staple for 4 years now. Do they watch the games?

“I don’t think Anthony (Griffin, former coach) in the past used his interchange that much and I can probably see why because he didn’t have the confidence in them."

I think someone alluded to this comment already - confirms what most of us suspected. Griffin had no faith in the bench so avoided using it as much as possible. We need a good 17 + depth, not just a good 13.

 

[Cult]

We need to start kicking off with one of those tall green tees. Kick it high to around their 20 and hit them hard when they catch it. Or just kick it along the ground. We kick the ball out off the kickoff more than any team it seems. It needs to be fixed.

 

[Huge]

We are a fair way off but aside from a few mistakes in the first half that half proved we were competitive. The second half proved that a winning team in good form will eventually overcome an enthusiastic team that has had quite a deal of change. Souths were good but not great and it is obvious that many have played together for some time. My guess is we will continue to get better and the Broncos are not a huge distance behind the front runners . I expect WB will keep them on task and the good times will come again.

I did think earlier on before the match started that Souths looked massive, right across the park with only one or two smaller players . What really stood out though was McGuire walking past Ben Hunt, they virtually looked like twins and that was when I thought we were still light on for big men. Hopefully we will pick up some more big guys and not Kennedy clones either !

 

[Anonymous person]

Well that's not what you said. You were criticising the bench use and saying how it should be used better. Stop changing things to suit your argument

Wtf? I criticized the bench use and I explained exactly what I didn't like about it. You questioned who I would play at hooker if I dumped McCullough immediately and I corrected you and said I didn't want to dump him immediately.

You're not making any sense.

Granville can play 80 can he? Well that's news, quick call Paul Green and tell him

If I was coach yes he would be able to because that would be his number 1 goal in training at this stage. We don't know he cant, he's never been given the opportunity.

If the game wasn't over at that point, McCullough doesn't come off.

So we have a coach who throws the towel in with a third of the game left? What happened to the whole "play the whole 80" thing?

 

[Alec]

“I don’t think Anthony (Griffin, former coach) in the past used his interchange that much and I can probably see why because he didn’t have the confidence in them."

I think someone alluded to this comment already - confirms what most of us suspected. Griffin had no faith in the bench so avoided using it as much as possible. We need a good 17 + depth, not just a good 13.

So basically Griffin was at the club for 4 years and couldn't build a decent bench (or at least one he would have called decent).

Bennett looks like thinks it's still shitty too.

 

[Anonymous person]

Whitchurch sure is a talent though lol. Rushed in from retirement to be on Bennetts bench.

Even when we've had matches under griffin where we only used 16 men our bench rotation was better than the other nights.

 

[Cult]

If I were coach we would have signed Folau, Luke, Brett Morris and DCE. I also would use flubber and train the players to jump into the try line and score. Training sessions would consist of learning how to stop bouncing with the flubber on their boots.

Brisbane Broncos+cult+flubber= success