Round 16 - PRE GAME - Newcastle Knights

[Sproj]

Yeah Dan walked into the tunnel after the win yesterday straight past me, he was limping pretty bad. On a side note, got a thumbs up from Alex Glenn, he said he could hear us few supporters in the crowd as we were very vocal. :)

 

[mitch222]

This is the NRL. You don't take any team lightly especially a team down the bottom who are trying to prove they are better than their current position. Last can easily beat first on their day that's how even the comp is these days. We don't ease up, not one bit. Full strength and full intensity. Bennett will have the team focused on the game.

 

[vertigo]

Danger game..



..for Newcastle.

But seriously this will be one of those games where you drop a bit of intensity and give them a sniff for no other reason than they are complete dog shit and are due to put in a 20 minute period of false hope for their supporters.

 

[Morkel]

Bennett needs to name a full-strength team and instruct them to go balls-out. Complete sets. Be ruthless in defence. Aggressive line-speed and kick-chase. Clinical last-tackle options. The points will flow from that and we should win by 30.

 

[Alec]

If we win this...

we'll end up having a PERFECT record during the Origin period.

 

[Rally Towel]

This could be the perfect storm going against us: pissed off knights players, short turn around after a very physical game and players not taking the opposition seriously given their form. It's happened before .

All valid points.

Not worried at all though. Wayne seems to be keeping the team well focused week to week.

Where before we were guilty of playing down to the level of our competition, we look hungry and switched on every week, no matter the opposition (first two weeks aside).

I'm expecting a few rotations due to origin fatigue but also expect us to do a number on them.

 

[noisetheory]

If we win this...

we'll end up having a PERFECT record during the Origin period.

i was thinking this last night but i think the dogs game in rnd 18 would still be counted as 'origin period' as we'll be backing up for origin 3.

 

[noisetheory]

Kade Snowden will miss the game even with early guilty plea after high tackle from the weekend. Makes things easier. he's actually been alright this year.

 

[Super Freak]

If we win this...

we'll end up having a PERFECT record during the Origin period.

We haven't done that since 99.

 

[ivanhungryjak]

So Reed has no case to answer for his "crusher tackle"?

 

[Morkel]

Charged. 100 points, but guilty plea is 75 and free to play.

 

[Kimlo]

Charged. 100 points, but guilty plea is 75 and free to play.

Looks like the NRL is doing the slow burn on us, get a bunch of our players really close to a hundred, and come finals time, bam lots of grade 1's and half our team is suspended.

 

[ivanhungryjak]

So Crushers are the new high tackle.
If your head even slightly gets caught up in the tackle, stay down and you'll get the penalty.

 

[Marty Deutschmann]

Looks like the NRL is doing the slow burn on us, get a bunch of our players really close to a hundred, and come finals time, bam lots of grade 1's and half our team is suspended.

Yeah i know right. . I'd have contested it at this stage of the year. . Better than having loading points and missing a final

 

[Super Freak]

Milford actually made it worse.

It wasn't going to happen until Milford came in and twisted Munster in the tackle.

 

[rnabokov]

Vidot out for 2-4 weeks

Good. He should be replaced permanently by Oates. We need consistently quality on the wing, and some speed, not a prop pretending to be not.

Also frees up a bench spot.

And any team in this comp which doesn't take any other team seriously doesn't deserve to win. Every performance has to be at 110% or more.

 

[GCBRONCO]

It's more his inability and at times unwillingness to contest the high ball that holds him back the most, for that reason I rank Kahu, Maranta and Oates ahead of him.

 

[jarro65]

I hope that Storm game didn't take too much out our tank.

Newcastle really didn't play too bad for the first half against the Sharks, so they have some decent footy in them.

Saying that though, the only real threat to us is ourselves.