Round 13 - Broncos vs Knights - Post Match Discussion

[Coxy]

Hoffman certainly needs to improve parts of his game. I found suggestions we move him to the wing to be laughable tbh.

Absolutely! He's not going to improve his support play in the ruck and his involvement in the 2nd man play by being on the wing!

 

[Anonymous person]

everyone seems to think Slater burst onto the scene with all the amazing stuff he does immediately, but forget that he used to be incredibly inconsistent.

not on bhq they didnt!

up to even last year, many on here still believed that Karmichael Hunt was the better fullback out of him and Slater lol. for years, when slater was scoring length of the field tries, chasing down kicks noone else could even come close to, and getting try assists out the wahzoo, he'd be absolutely torn apart for dropping a single bomb or doing a forward pass. Slater couldve scored 5 tries a game, 24 games a season, but if he dropped a ball once itd be all 'see i told you hes rubbish, karmichael wouldnt have dropped that!'.

but after a golden boot or 2, a dally m with another stolen from him, and more tries and awards than you can possibly remember, BHQ seems to have come around. finally.

 

[Coxy]

Or as is really the case, BHQ (as if it's some collective consciousness) said all along that Slater was a very good player who had a hair pulling habit of having an absolute brain explosion at the worst possible time. It cost us a World Cup...

In the last 2-3 years he has got that brain explosion completely out of his game, refined his ball playing skills and is now without doubt the most complete fullback since Lockyer at his peak there in 2002.

 

[Anonymous person]

It cost us a World Cup...

thats like saying that referees cost NSW game 1 this year - Australia was still ahead after Slater threw that pass that they intercepted and scored from.

with a player like him you take the 1% bad with the 99% excellent. BHQ didnt want a bar of it though, because he wasnt Hunt.

 

[Coxy]

thats like saying that referees cost NSW game 1 this year - Australia was still ahead after Slater threw that pass that they intercepted and scored from.

You don't get momentum do you?

 

[ningnangnong]

So we've gone from talking about Hoffman, to another Hunt vs Slater debate... argh!

I know it's very loosely related to the subject, but can we get back on topic now please, gang. :handshake:

 

[Jeba]

I thought we were losing by 2 points before he threw the pass??

 

[Coxy]

I thought we were losing by 2 points before he threw the pass??

Indeed you are correct! And there was 20 minutes to go.

 

[Ari Gold]

WTF! who has ever said he is the world's best fullback. Say what you want but Hoffy is a great young fullback that is only going to continue to get better, everyone seems to think Slater burst onto the scene with all the amazing stuff he does immediately, but forget that he used to be incredibly inconsistent.

I totally agree. He is a great young fullback, and he will get better. But he's not there yet.

There seems to be a trend where if you criticize someone after a loss, whenever that player does well in a win people are like "where are the Hoffman critics now". And I wanted to make my comment after he played a great game, because I believe they are true. The thing about Hoffman is that when he plays great, he really does seem like an epic fullback, because he is so strong at his strengths that when he gets to play to them he is just massive. The areas he needs to work on still exist though, and as Coxy said, we are going to need him to step up in those areas come finals time.

And yeah, I wanted to make that point after we won and he played a great game, so it doesn't just seem like I'm criticizing whenever we lose.

 

[Jeba]

Lol so true, Ari. You (rightfully) critisize a player for having a poor game then a few games later they play much better and everyone is like "Oh where are the Hoffman baggers now". It's like, the Hoffman baggers aren't here...because he didn't have a bad game....duh!

When people are critical of a player, they're not necessarily suggesting that they are forever crap - They are merely knocking the individual match performance.

But after the Storm game people were saying that Hoffman shouldn't be at fullback because of his ball playing skills (or lack thereof). People had Norman going to fullback and Hoffman going to the wing. That's not just a jab at the individual match performance, that's a suggestion that he's not upto being our fullback.

 

[Coxy]

And those kinds of suggestions are ridiculous. You don't fix a player's deficiencies by playing them out of position.

Just look at Ben hunt. He's going backwards

 

[Anonymous person]

Edit by ning: Removed off-topic section of post.

There seems to be a trend where if you criticize someone after a loss, whenever that player does well in a win people are like "where are the Hoffman critics now".

a certain wayne bennett fan is the biggest offender of this.

on hoffman, i dont see what everyones so concerned about. hes going great guns and is only VERY young. just because hes not the worlds best support player in a team that often struggles with its halves providing direction in attack doesnt mean he wont improve.

 

[Porthoz]

Hey guys, that thing Ning was talking about earlier. You know... the sticking to the topic at hand.
He meant this thread!