frankLauda
Matthew Gidley
Was there a Hollbrook interview also?
Knights Podcasts!
- Thread starter jamesgould
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HarVeeGee13
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
What really stuck out to me there is that a real point of emphasis in Holbrook's philosophy is thinking about what other coaches might do to nullify the threats on his team, and they work on ways to respond to that and get the key strike players involved anyway. Yep. That has been a massive, massive difference this year.
I always felt like AOB was very "this is the system, the system works, if we just execute the system CORRECTLY, good things will happen". Even in our really good attacking season in 2023 with seemingly every player on the team on fire, it's kind of amazing how many times we scored basically the exact same try.
I actually wouldn't say there's been some massive overhaul of shape and structure under Holbrook - obviously with the roster we have, we want to compress the middle, stop defenders for sliding, and exploit the mismatches we have in those wide channels. There's just differences in both philosophy & detail. A lot more "if the defence is giving us this look, we do this" and a willingness to attack even off a lost ruck if the numbers are there. Rather than "get this sort of platform, work to spot A, run shape B if you get a quick ruck, if you do it well enough it can't be stopped".
It's probably correct that *when everything is humming* the AOB model was very very hard to stop, but what about when you're losing the middle? What if your guys are just a bit "off" today? What then? It feels like we've gone from rarely having answers to usually having them. Even in games we've lost.
Might explain the way the team score's so many different tries this year in comparison to previous years. Especially from longer range. Spreading the ball early on both sides, finding the mismatch to make the line break like the Raiders game (Manu, Fletch etc). But then you can't just keep an eye on one gamebreaker because Brown/Sharpe/Ponga etc can also make something out of nothing. Lucas was also on a try scoring run before his injury. You just have to watch out for everyone.
And they're not just because of bad defence at times, it's just forcing the defence to adjust and guess as to who will make the play. Sure sometimes it doesn't always work out and it leads to errors if the passes aren't thrown well enough, but you live with that.
And they're not just because of bad defence at times, it's just forcing the defence to adjust and guess as to who will make the play. Sure sometimes it doesn't always work out and it leads to errors if the passes aren't thrown well enough, but you live with that.
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bremsstrahlung
Craig Kimmorley
Just caught up on Lucas and Croker on Matty Johns Sunday Night show.
Nothing too crazy.
Dylan said his surgery went well, moonboot is off, still a bit swollen but ticking the boxes and should be all good for 2027.
Croker attributed his form this season to being given more responsibility from Holbrook. Somewhat alluded to having no direction under AOB and didn’t know where he stood, so was just in limbo essentially with his role. But Holbrook has trusted him and made it clear what he wants.
They tried to get Dylan’s feelings on his Origin debut and gave them the one liner that it was a good experience, but didn’t quite get the opportunities he would have liked. And then Matty essentially went into a tangent about the narrative that an origin game can go by so quickly - I’m not sure if it was Lucas being a bit shy, unsure of what to say, or if he was slightly offended the insinuation he had a **** game was being brought up.
Croker essentially chalked the Manly game off as being one of those games. Said Manly were throwing the ball around a lot, and they were doing alright defending it, but when Dom was off and a man down they got on top.
Not a Knights podcast - but Backstage (Matty Johns) did an interview with Shaun Johnson - very good listen. I can see him potentially going down the Matty Johns pathway. He’s a bit of a joker, has some charisma about him, but also knows his footy and seems to be able to break things down quite well. He made a comment that he hates the typical journalist - so endeavours to not put players down when he speaks about the game, to recognise the human element.
Made a comment that he hates how commentators can shape the public’s opinion. Example given was with line breaks “he just had to draw the defender and pass” Johnson takes offence to those types of comments and says that “it’s the 75th minute, they’ve made 30 tackles and ran for 200m already, and the defender positions himself beautifully to break up the play”. Instead of blaming the attacker for not converting the try, in some cases, it’s the great work of the defender.
There was one with our game vs Canberra. I think Hunt and Sharpe were combining and got the break. As it starts to unfold, I thought they should be able to get the try. But I think Stuart ran from the opposite wing, to put himself in the position to get to Sharpe. It was Stuart’s defensive effort that defended that situation, not a ‘failure’ on Hunt/Sharpe.
Anyway, worth a listen. I’m yet to listen to the interview with Keary and if he mentions Holbrook or Newcastle job at all.
Nothing too crazy.
Dylan said his surgery went well, moonboot is off, still a bit swollen but ticking the boxes and should be all good for 2027.
Croker attributed his form this season to being given more responsibility from Holbrook. Somewhat alluded to having no direction under AOB and didn’t know where he stood, so was just in limbo essentially with his role. But Holbrook has trusted him and made it clear what he wants.
They tried to get Dylan’s feelings on his Origin debut and gave them the one liner that it was a good experience, but didn’t quite get the opportunities he would have liked. And then Matty essentially went into a tangent about the narrative that an origin game can go by so quickly - I’m not sure if it was Lucas being a bit shy, unsure of what to say, or if he was slightly offended the insinuation he had a **** game was being brought up.
Croker essentially chalked the Manly game off as being one of those games. Said Manly were throwing the ball around a lot, and they were doing alright defending it, but when Dom was off and a man down they got on top.
Not a Knights podcast - but Backstage (Matty Johns) did an interview with Shaun Johnson - very good listen. I can see him potentially going down the Matty Johns pathway. He’s a bit of a joker, has some charisma about him, but also knows his footy and seems to be able to break things down quite well. He made a comment that he hates the typical journalist - so endeavours to not put players down when he speaks about the game, to recognise the human element.
Made a comment that he hates how commentators can shape the public’s opinion. Example given was with line breaks “he just had to draw the defender and pass” Johnson takes offence to those types of comments and says that “it’s the 75th minute, they’ve made 30 tackles and ran for 200m already, and the defender positions himself beautifully to break up the play”. Instead of blaming the attacker for not converting the try, in some cases, it’s the great work of the defender.
There was one with our game vs Canberra. I think Hunt and Sharpe were combining and got the break. As it starts to unfold, I thought they should be able to get the try. But I think Stuart ran from the opposite wing, to put himself in the position to get to Sharpe. It was Stuart’s defensive effort that defended that situation, not a ‘failure’ on Hunt/Sharpe.
Anyway, worth a listen. I’m yet to listen to the interview with Keary and if he mentions Holbrook or Newcastle job at all.
Yeah Origin ratings are always a laugh because the bench guys who've done nothing wrong but sometimes play less then 20-30 mins a game get a 3/10 or 4/10. And it's usually only because the team lost like NSW did in that G2 in this instance. No Bench player should be getting less then a 5/10 unless they get themselves binned/sent off or make a costly mistake or something like that.
Then you get idiots like Paul Crawley who weren't really paying attention once the game was done and dusted giving the back end of bench players 3/4 out of 10
SJ is good and can work as a media personality because he was pretty much a choirboy his whole career and never had an issue off field, being liked by everyone also helps. The biggest story was him leaving the Warriors but even they patched things up when he came back and finished his career there, which you love to see.
You can see similar things with Reynolds. Just an all round good bloke who never really got into any strife off the field. He's more interested in coaching but wouldn't have an issue with transitioning into a panel podcast or talk show guy either the way someone like Keary was.
Then you get idiots like Paul Crawley who weren't really paying attention once the game was done and dusted giving the back end of bench players 3/4 out of 10
SJ is good and can work as a media personality because he was pretty much a choirboy his whole career and never had an issue off field, being liked by everyone also helps. The biggest story was him leaving the Warriors but even they patched things up when he came back and finished his career there, which you love to see.
You can see similar things with Reynolds. Just an all round good bloke who never really got into any strife off the field. He's more interested in coaching but wouldn't have an issue with transitioning into a panel podcast or talk show guy either the way someone like Keary was.