The great…
It was so bloody good to see Crossland lead the team out. Don’t think anybody personifies hard work, grit, determination more than him. I was deadset baffled when we re-signed him a few years ago. He looked gone for all money. But, I think he’s a perfect example of where hard work and motivation can get you. Where he lacks natural silky skills, he more than makes up for with heart. Really happy for him.
The bad…
**** injuries. Wishing Dylan’s speedy recoveries.
Assuming Lucas will be into surgery last night or this morning. Looked very much like a fracture dislocation (I don’t think I’ve ever seen an isolated dislocated ankle- incredibly rare), - getting it relocated into the right orientation helps with the ligaments - you don’t want them stretched for too long. Plates and screws. He would be good to go for next season - probably has enough time to get the hardware out as well if they want to. The mental trauma of seeing your foot the wrong way is the hard part and getting confidence back. But giving shakkas on his way off - legend. Absolutely gutted for him - he was a few games away from deserving a green and gold jersey.
I’m a little worried for Brown. He partially did his ACL 2 years ago. They don’t repair themselves. You rehab the muscles around the knee and strengthen them and they act to help support. That mechanism looks pretty similar to how I did my partial and then the rest of it 12 months later. Significantly less painful when you’ve got a partial and it doesn’t take much. Think he knew something was wrong straight away too. Fingers crossed for him, but expecting the worst.
The result - to lose to Roosters by one DCE field goal is heartbreaking with our outs is tough. They deserved some points tonight. Still think this is our karma for winning some games we had no right to earlier.
The good…
Manu with a cracker of a game. His runs are very Lucas-esque. It’s nice to see the consistency across the grades. Like are we training them to run these lines? (In a lot of sokkah clubs, they get the reserves and even junior academies to play the same formation and style as the first team, so that they can easily move along the grades seemlessly - think Ivan implemented similar at Penrith). Improving kick position should be on the whiteboard for the rest of the season with our recent narrow losses and poor goalkicking. If McEwen is back next week and he keeps this up, I think we will be in good shape. (Don’t mean to bag the guy, but Cant probably locks in a 2nd row bench spot for the rest of the season…). But I thought he did really well with his break to sum it up. Got through, looks around, gets his plan, draws teddy, passes to a rampaging Best and we score. Great execution.
Nice to see Sharpe run a little more. He’s dangerous. I think we have done him a bit of a disservice moving him around so much. He’s very talented, and obviously capable of doing a job. But Centre, Half and Fullback have such specific skillsets and not having consistency week to week there, limits performance.
Smith still has some defensive moments he needs to work on. But I think he’s capable of delivering in attack when we need it. Looking forward to seeing what he can do with the 7 on his back for the foreseeable future. Hopefully gives him a bit of confidence and allows him to get comfortable if he knows it’s his job for the rest of the season.
Kind of sick of saying it; because I think the team deserves better. But proud of their effort. Last few weeks they’ve really dig deep with a fair chunk of adversity. They’ve really deserved something to show for their performance. Hopefully this effort repays us in the back end. The injuries are bad. But it’s been really great to see everyone step up.
Hopefully we take some confidence that we seem capable of beating anybody, if we play well.