We're back to the first half of last year with some of our spine thinking every half chance is a reason to go for the low percentage play.
As much as I love Oates, Bennett was drooling once he was selected as wing and good old dropsy dick fingers delivered on queue. He's like that slow old 82 hilux ute that keeps turning up with solid carries - but his hands have been horrid for years. Tonight, his biggest contribution was destorying the hammer's hamstring - which actually probably gave us the edge to be fair, but that was bad luck for Hammer, nothing more. Oatsey put down bombs, wasn't in position for 2 potential tries, was too far in field for another and just ever so barely got to the try he scored. Defensively, he got caught out of position a few times and his actions directly contributed to two tries against us tonight.
He might be able to service a backup role off the bench for the second row, but he doesn't have the hands, defensive chops or speed to handle a wing role any longer and hasn't looked even half servicable there since Drinky broke his jaw which is a terrible shame. He had a horror run of injuries last year, but the games he did play after he came back from his jaw - he was equally as terrible as tonight.
Most of the team made errors tonight though so it's hard to be too tough on just Oates as there were lots of players deserving an absolute rocket after tonight - putrid handling all round. Giving away 8 penalties and 17 errors. Any half decent team takes that kind of display and puts 50 on us. Thankfully they were hot trash.
