Plenty of bite left in the Dogs
It’s been a tumultuous week for the Canterbury club but considering they were the architects of their own misery (it was a penalty, etc) it’s hard to feel all that sorry for them. But, as a famous red head once enthused, the sun’ll come up tomorrow. And if life is to be worth living one must soldier on with hope in the heart and grievances cast to the wind. But will the Bulldogs so readily jettison their grievances? Conversely, will they keep hold of them, feed and nurture them so as to drive them on — in spite of the overwhelming evidence that they aren’t, in any way, innocent victims of referees, the NRL, the world? The Bulldogs’ new day dawns on Sunday when they’ll face a defensively excellent if offensively constipated Dragons outfit. And in keeping with a fresh start they’ll face the Dragons without five of their best —casualties, in one way or another, of that memorable game against South Sydney last week. Gone are James Graham, David Klemmer, Sam Kasiano, Tim Lafai and, robbing him of the opportunity to face his old team for the first time this year, Brett Morris. That’s some list of absentees but there’s still plenty of bite left in the dog and motivation will be high. The Dragons best beware.
Beware the feather dusters
With little fanfare Wayne Bennett’s mob have distanced themselves from their poor season opener to cruise into a share of the competition lead after four straight wins. Amazing what happens when you stop fining players for wearing odd socks and eating all the pies. You could argue (perhaps against logic) that that’s a higher position than their form warrants — only against the Cowboys have they really clicked — but they’ll take it, especially having had to play in recent weeks without top 17 players like Justin Hodges, Jordan Kahu, Darius Boyd and Adam Blair. No doubt we’ll get a better line on the Broncos’ form on Friday night when they play the Sydney Roosters. You couldn’t pick a worse week to play the Roosters, what with Trent Robinson’s men being made to look like feather dusters by the lowly Sharks last week. And with Jared Warea-Hargreaves set to harden up the pack like quick set concrete the Roosters will be looking for atonement.
A bumper signing, now for a win
The gloom of consecutive losses —and three from five losses in all— was momentarily forgotten midweek when the New Zealand Warriors announced the signing of red-hot-stepping Roosters fullback Roger Tuivasa-Sheck who’ll join the club at the end of the current season. It’s a big loss for a club that’s not accustomed to losing star players, and that showed in the extraordinary public denunciation of Tuivasa-Sheck’s decision by Roosters recruitment manager Peter O’Sullivan. You’d almost think the Roosters had never used their big cheque book to lure players to Bondi. For the Warriors, a club who aren’t accustomed to getting who they want, Tuivasa-Sheck will more than compensate for the loss of a homesick Sam Tomkins who, in his first year, didn’t hold the kind of sway he did in Super League (where he’ll return at season’s end). But Warriors fans need not wish away 2015; Tomkins has time yet to make a mark, as do the Warriors.
That said, as of now the Warriors are in familiar territory, defending themselves against the perception that they’re inherently wishy-washy and not to be relied upon. It hasn’t helped that their best player, Shaun Johnson (the best player in the world, as judged by the 2014 Golden Boot nominations panel) is not yet firing on all cylinders as he did to spectacular effect in November’s Four Nations. Johnson has this season already dismissed critics of his form but what can we do but judge someone against their best? Still, when the Warriors don’t respect the football — as was the case against the Storm on Monday night — Johnson, like his halves partner Chad Townsend, is forced to play off the back foot and from such a position it’s much harder for him to pull rabbits from hats, saw opposition players in half, and levitate above the plane of mere mortals. Pressure will be on Johnson and the Warriors this week after their recent run of outs and given the Tigers’ impressive performance against Parramatta last weekend, and the Warriors’ short turnaround, the New Zealanders will need to improve notably to win in Auckland on Saturday.
One in a row: do we hear ‘two’?
After last week’s deserved win against the Sydney Roosters Cronulla are on a roll. What is it now, one in a row? Yes, one —their first win in 11 NRL matches spanning back to round 20, 2014. After such a drought one win is heavenly, like a sudden downpour that conjures steam off the bitumen and enriches the air with the fecund aroma of wet earth. But after one win, why not beat the Newcastle Knights at home and make it two? Like backward sons who live in the hollers with their stills, weed and unhinged hounds, the Sharks are easily maligned (see?), but they showed last week that if they can get their heads together they are a capable outfit, a long way from spoon material. That forward pack is some unit, like a crack team you’d send into the jungles with Arnold Swarzenegger on a mission to retrieve captured POWs: Paul Gallen, Andrew and David Fifita, Michael Ennis, Luke Lewis, Chris Heighington. True, their backs are comparatively tame but after the (Ben Barba-killing?) performances of Jackson Bird and Valentine Holmes against the Roosters, there’s a backline forming that could spring some traps this year. The Knights’ unbeaten run had to end sometime but their sudden sense of mortality might dovetail nicely with the Sharks renewed sense of self belief.
The insidious ‘normalisation’ of gambling continues
It’s not that long ago that Tom Waterhouse’s face inspired a collective groan and perhaps even a Pavlovian clenching of fists. He was everywhere, not least entwined in Channel Nine’s NRL coverage spruking his gambling business. The Nine team would throw to him as if he was a co-commentator whose views (of relieving us of our hard earned) were worth considering. It was all too much for us to take and after a lot of negative publicity the waterhousing of the public, facilitated by Nine, was wound back. But has anything really changed? Sportsbet, for one, have snuck up on us like melanoma, and fronted by former NRL player, and Fox Sports commentator, Joel Caine, they are are a ubiquitous presence in Nine’s and Foxtel’s game day coverage. While “live odds” are no longer allowed, Caine, as with Waterhouse, is slipped into the coverage and we’re encouraged to hear him out and, by association, get our wallets out. As a reminder, we’re bombarded with commercials that drive home the erroneous notion that gambling on the game is part of the match-day experience, that it’s what regular knockabout Aussie blokes do, that it can even rescue you from being so emasculated that you’d hold your girlfriend’s hand at a party. Considering the problems professional sport has with match-fixing, considering the consequences of gambling addiction, can any good come from this continued relationship between the gambling industry and professional sporting bodies like the NRL? Will it one day be seen in the same way we now view the sport sponsorship once offered by big tobacco?
Fixtures
Friday:
Brisbane Broncos v Sydney Roosters, Suncorp, 7:35pm
Cronulla Sharks vs Newcastle Knights, 7:35pm
Saturday:
Parramatta Eels vs Gold Coast Titans, 3pm
New Zealand Warriors vs Wests Tigers, 5:30pm
Penrith Panthers vs Manly Sea Eages, 7:30pm
Sunday:
Canberra Raiders vs Melbourne Storm, 2pm
St George Illawarra Dragons vs Canterbury Bulldogs, 4pm
Monday:
South Sydney Rabbitohs vs North Queensland Cowboys, 7pm
