Was watching replays last night -beginning with Newcastle v Cronulla.
The Sharks are on some sort of roll. A couple of weeks ago, when I was making a big broo-ha-ha about their form, Huge pointed out that it was more or less down to bad luck. Since then, the tide has definitely turned for them because I don't think anyone could have scripted those games better. There's been some real Easter miracles in there, knock ons into penalties that sort of stuff. However, between all the lucky bounces and what not there's been some really good performances.
One player who hasn't been mentioned but has definitely made a difference is Luke Lewis. He's one of those players who sort of goes missing when it comes time to handing out wraps because his numbers are nothing really to write home about but the skill-set he brings and his experience has really given the Sharks a lot of variety on the edges and that's where they're causing most of the damage with the forwards doing a really good job of winning the ruck.
As for the game itself, I thought it was in the balance until Bird swooped on a speculator from Fifita to set up and score his own try. That gave Cronulla the lead and within moments they extended it again when they worked the same outside inside ball play for Bird and they scored another beauty off the boot of Valentine Holmes. It was that man I was talking about Lewis who chased and got himself infront of the Knights backs.
At 12-2, it was all Cronulla and within moments of the second half, Barba pulled the Knights pants down to score a pretty simple try down Newcastle's right hand touchline. At that point, the conditions became god awful and it was always going to be tough to peg back.
If you're going to pull something like that off, you need to play near perfect football. Unfortunately, the Knights were their own worst enemies, coming up with impatient plays and not really playing to their strengths. For instance, the commentators went crook at Gagai for being quiet but I honestly didn't see him get much of an opportunity to get involved. There wasn't much early ball coming his way to try and put his moves on Leutele and the one opportunity he did get, he was able to put Uate over in the corner for an easy try.
Uate's hundreth too.
That's the Knights second loss in a row and their second poor performance in a row. Mind you, even when they were winning I thought a lot of it could be written off as early season form and going up against teams who were missing key players (Warriors, Penrith) or they're notoriously slow starters (Warriors, Cowboys). What I'm saying is, a lot of these problems existed before their losses, it's just very clear now.
They've got to make a call on Sione Mata'utia. There's no doubt he's talented, but this current situation where they change the complexion of the spine is putting the Knights in all sorts. They just lack a little cohesion when he comes on, so either they make a call and have him play fullback in place of Kidley full-time, have him replace McManus on the wing or they let him build some confidence in reserves because right now, it's hindering more than it's helping.
Not sure what's happened to the halves but they've gone from a strength to a weakness very quickly. Mullen had to be playing injured because Graham was getting around him with consummate ease and he really hasn't been himself at all in 2015. And T. Roberts...he's always been an inconsistent player but he's always had something in him. Lately, it's all been dud plays, one after the other and he just isn't asking enough questions of the defence. So far it's all hit-up, hit-up, hit-up, spread to Leilua, put in a ordinary last tackle kick. I mean, they could pay so many ISC halves to do the same thing and basically get around the same if not better results.
Next week they'll welcome back Robbie Rochow which should help. I thought Houston was amongst one of their worst last week and really shouldn't be playing on the fringes anymore. It's lock forward or bustfor him. They may also have to consider re-tooling their bench. Perhaps push one of the Sims brothers to the bench to provide some genuine impact which has been alluding them in recent weeks and giving a Sam Mataora a chance to stake his claim as Stockwell seems to be struggling.
It isn't panic stations yet for them but their halves need to start firing and they need to play more as a team instead of trying to find a way to shoe-horn players into their side.
