Round 1 Discussion

[Bucking Beads]

I reckon it's time to promote Segeyaro to the QLD squad bench. He could Craig Wing it up from there, he's genuinely getting better and better, and still hasn't reached his peak. Could be the next great supersub IMO.

I hope the selectors go down this path. Segeyaro is just unreal. Easily my favourite player to watch at the moment.

 

[Rally Towel]

I hope the selectors go down this path. Segeyaro is just unreal. Easily my favourite player to watch at the moment.

To this day, I still can't believe Cowboys let him go. Absolutely baffling.

Given Penrith's generally frugal tendencies, I find it hard to believe they couldn't have matched the offer.

Good thing they have Kostjasyn....

 

[Bucking Beads]

To this day, I still can't believe Cowboys let him go. Absolutely baffling.

Given Penrith's generally frugal tendencies, I find it hard to believe they couldn't have matched the offer.

Good thing they have Kostjasyn....

I don't believe the Cowboys wanted him to leave. I am sure Segeyaro wanted to move down to Sydney and Penrith gave him a pretty good offer.

 

[ivanhungryjak]

I don't believe the Cowboys wanted him to leave. I am sure Segeyaro wanted to move down to Sydney and Penrith gave him a pretty good offer.

Yep, he was on Talkin Sports this arvo saying he wanted to go back to Sydney.

 

[BroncosAlways]

My god George Rose has gotten even bigger.

 

[BroncosAlways]

Dugan with the worst dive you've ever seen. 10x worse than Luke's from a few years ago.

 

[Super Freak]

I don't have much of a problem with that tackle..

He was already committed before Marshall kicked it.. But technically it's a penalty and I think Dragons could break them here.

 

[Super Freak]

Or maybe not.. That was a pretty average set.

 

[I bleed Maroon]

Dragons are such a terrible team. I love it.

 

[Bucking Beads]

Super work from Benji

 

[Bucking Beads]

Melbourne have dropped a lot of ball tonight

 

[BroncosAlways]

Dugan with his obligatory injury.

Alexander " he's got no luck has he dugan, he's down injured 3-4 times a game"

No, he's just a soft prick incapable of playing week to week footy

 

[Bucking Beads]

Terrible game. The Dragons looked so unorganized. Is it all on Rein or do the halves need to guide that ship a bit better .

 

[Big Pete]

Good win for Melbourne. Didn't bring their A game but were far too strong defensively and the Dragons simply don't have enough talent to trouble them. Watching St George reminded me a lot of Manly on Friday where they have two good halves and not a whole lot else. Melbourne handled most of their middle men with ease, Rein was a non-factor and whenever he did get involved it was mostly negative and the three quaters offered nothing. Nightingale tried to get involved but there's not a lot you can do.

Not many individuals really impressed me at Melbourne. Bromwich was as handy as ever, Smith had a few class plays, bit of Slater magic but the players who stood out for me were the wingers. Made good ground and were usually the players winning the ruck for Melbourne. However, it was a game won on defence and like I said, if I was a Melbourne fan, I'd be satisfied with the two points.

 

[Big Pete]

South Sydney Rabbitohs 36 (Walker, Sutton, Inglis, Keary, Reddy tries; Reynolds 8/8 goals) defeated Brisbane Broncos 6 (Gillett try; Parker 1/2 goals)

Parramatta Eels 42 (Radradra 3, Sandow 2, Hopoate, Takairangi tries; Robinson 7/8 goals) defeated Manly Sea Eagles 12 (Stewart, Blair tries; Lyon 2/2 goals)

Newcastle Knights 24 (Gagai 2, Randell, Rochow tries; Roberts 3/3, Randell 1/1 goals) defeated New Zealand Warriors 14 (Leuluai, Hoffman tries; Johnson 3/3 goals)

Wests Tigers 19 (Richards 2, Tedesco tries; Richards 3/3 goals; Richards Field Goal) defeated Gold Coast Titans 18 (Roberts 2, James tries; Sezer 3/4 goals)

Sydney Roosters 28 (Cordner 2, Tupou, Jennings, Guerra tries; Maloney 4/5 goals) defeated North Queensland Cowboys 4 (O'Neil try; Thurston 0/1 goal)

Penrith Panthers 24 (Watene Zelezniak 2, Jennings, Segeyaro tries; Soward 4/5 goals) defeated Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 18 (Browne, Rona, B. Morris tries; Hodkinson 3/3 goals)

Canberra Raiders 24 (Wighton 2, Rapana, Waqa tries; Croker 4/5 goals) defeated Cronulla Sharks 20 (Tupou, Feki, Leutele tries; Gordon 4/5 goals)

Melbourne Storm 12 (Tonumaipea, Chambers tries; Smith 2/2 goals) defeated St George Illawarra Dragons 4 (Nabuli tries; Widdop 0/1 goals)

 

[Broncoman]

I still don't how Vaughan keeps starting off the bench for the Raiders. I know in context of the match it doesn't matter if he plays heaps of minutes anyway, but it terms of his career it seems to have him less noticed. I guess playing for the Faders doesn't help either. He'd be pushing for Origin in other sides.

Woods, A.Fifita and Klemmer would be ahead of him in the origin stakes atm. Vaughn although does have great potential and will likely play Origin at some point. Good example of all the great young talent coming through the NSW ranks.

 

[Big Pete]

Thanks to the delayed coverage, it took me until just before for me to watch the clash.

A shame as it was one of the better clashes of the weekend. Penrith really look like they've gone another level this year and while they let themselves down in the final ten minutes and were fortunate to hang on it's really difficult to fault their first 60 or so. Segeyaro was on fire and was as menacing as ever around the ruck, the forwards really did their job and contained the Canterbury forwards in the middle and every once in awhile they'd do something skillful (eg Cartwright and Latimore offloads) that resulted in points. Late in the contest it appeared that the referee was squaring up the penalty count and along the way the Panthers helped them with some dumb infringements and errors. It's good that they learned that lesson with a win quite early because if it happened later I don't know if they'd be so lucky.

Dogs were never really in it. I was really interested to see how the new recruits would go and I thought they were clearly a level below their counter-parts at this stage. Lichaa's service was all over the place, it was like Healey's Sunday Footy Show performance while Rona looked a little too self-assured and got his pants pulled down by Watene-ZeleniARK (hate it when commentators adjust pronounciations mid-game, just go with NACK Rabs) in the try that ultimately won them the game. Reynolds was back to his inconsistent best where he had moments of brilliance (a 40/20 and the effort to set up Brett Morris) and then moments of sheer stupidity (another blatant trip, the deliberate forward pass etc.). I think Des has done a fair job of making Reynolds into anything more than just an Anthony Watts type but if I was him, I'd be pushing hard for Foran. Considering Josh is most likely out for three weeks, I'm going to be interested to see how the Dogs go with Mybe in the halves. Unless Des goes back to not playing with halves and puts T-Rex there. Somebody could correct me, but I think T-Rex is actually a premiership winning half in the ISC and guess who his partner was? That's right, Trent Hodkinson. It could be the Sunshine Coast Sea Eagles circa 2009 all over again.

But yeah, plenty of improvement in the Dogs. I get the feeling they were simply out-enthused by Penrith here and they're content to just go at their own pace till they get a few things right. I have no idea why they played so flat though...were they really that determined to send Browne over for a try?