12th July 2017
The 5 day day turnaround took its toll on the team. They came out poorly in first half and let the Roosters get away to a lead they they couldn't peg back. A team with a better air defence was able to contain our kicking game this week. Winning the second half was a good step forward but the team needs to play for 80 minutes. Our season is becoming very difficult, with 7 more wins required from 8 matches to make the finals.
Next season will lookvery different from 2017. Already Rochow has been released but also departing are our centre combination of Bryson Goodwin and Aaron Gray. Gagai who won man of the SOO series this year will slot straight in.
Jack Gosiewski has been making a good steady return from injury and has formed a strong second row combination with Cameron Murray. Both a playing well and will be good backup if injury of form impacts our first grade squad.
Congratulations to Campbell Graham and Ky rodwell on their Australian Schoolboys championship selections this week. They will continue to add value in years to come.
Lower grade scheduling continues to be a long term issue for fans. Fans continue to get shut out of being ble to see their lower grade stars. Take this weekend for example U20s is on Saturday 1pm, Reserve Grade is on Sunday 3pm while First Grade is being broadcast at 4pm. This weekend was a classic example when smarter scheduling should have been applied with both U20s and NSW Premiership matches being played at North Sydney Oval on Saturday 1pm and 3pm.
Round 18 - Stat Attack
Statistically a poor first half and struggled against a Top 4 defensive team. Completion rates dropped to a average level of 78% from 86% last week. Errors were dropped to 10 from 6 last week. We gave away 8 penalities again this week. Souths Effective 1st tackle dropped to a poor level of 35.5m from 24.2m last week. Our missed tackles improved to a average level of 28 missed tackles from 37 last week. Opposition offloads dropped to 5 from 4 last week.
Looking at our left side defence - Johnston-Goodwin-Sutton-TFuimaono/SBurgess (1-0-1-5) dropped to 7 from 6 last week. On the right side Burns-AGray-Reynolds-Crichton (1-3-3-3) was improved to 10 from 11 missed tackles last week. Ruck defence TBurgess/Musgrove-Farah/Cook-Tyrrell/GBurgess-SBurgess/Clark (3-4-2-2) improved to 11 from 19 missed tackles last week.
Our go forward this week dropped to 1536m from 1714m. Tom Burgess, Tyrrell, Goodwin and Reynolds made 10+m per run. Sam Burgess, George Burgess, Crichton, Walker, Burns, Johnston and Reynolds making 100+m in the match. Defensively Sam Burgess was our best in the tackling raking up 35 tackles. Clark, George Burgess, Goodwin and Walker not missing a tackle.