I tried to articulate this point in erratic frustration during the warriors live chat thread, and as a long term fan but not a player/student of the game please somebody correct me if this view is naive or too unfair.
It seems increasingly obvious we are too passive of a team and try too hard to comply to the rule book. Maybe this is a byproduct of nice guy Kevie as our coach, missing Reyno, or just not being tactical enough. But we seem to never dictate the ruck speed in attack or defence, and never try pushing the limit of the officiating.
We set a precedent that we’ll clear the ruck as quick and meekly as possible, and perhaps subconsciously, the refs seem to hold us to that higher standard. Even when they don’t get a dominant tackle, your storm and panthers of the world will wrestle and tactically buy that extra few seconds. If they concede a penalty along the way they don’t care, because the ref won’t ping every time and eventually go soft.
We also miss Reyno holding the refs to account and whinging every so often. It irks me as a viewer but is sadly needed. Patty isn’t (yet) that guy.
Another thing that resonates with me is on the bloke podcast after last years GF, fish saying something along the lines of them learning from their ‘21 loss that they were too nice and gave their opposition too much respect. We honestly need at least a shift towards this line of thinking. I thought last year we were working towards it but I think it was an illusion because we were just riding the wave of our purple patch and fast paced play coming off more often than not.
