Been waiting for this Owey, understand where you’ve been coming from a lot better now.
The short answer is “yes”, if there’s a ‘go to’ thing I think our attack should be about, it’s opening up the left side of the field as much as possible, with Dylan Brown going into the line with options on his outside, Ponga sweeping around, in a variety of shapes and combinations. I don’t believe in a “Melbourne style” attacking system with the personnel we have. I think stylistically, teams like Souths, Easts and Parramatta make more sense as a general guide for what we should be looking to do. Obviously you don’t just attack one side of the field and that’s it but knowing in advance Souths were looking to set up Cody & Latrell on the left didn’t ever seem to make them particularly easy to stop.
I would look to play with a split field, Brown left, Smith right, as a general rule, but with alternation of which half is on the 1st & 2nd layer, and both Brown & Smith flipping over to act as the second receiver/sweeper depending on what looks the defensive line is giving them etc. The two of them are both very familiar with playing in this way. Visions of Ponga set up on the left with a wide 4-on-4 short side with Brown set to swing around Smith’s outside on the right, or Brown set up on the short side with Ponga looking to sweep, etc. I don’t think either Brown or Smith should be “on the ball”, if anything I’d want Brown ending most games with more ball receipts than Smith because if he hasn’t tested the line with his running game 10-15 times per game I’m not happy with his performance.
I actually don’t think Brown was sold on being the ‘on ball’ 7 at all, as he tells it number on the back was never even discussed. I’ve come to the conclusion actually that the idea was getting two dynamic ball runners into the halves, having a lot of ‘switching’ of roles, but ultimately Ponga carrying a lot of the ‘halfback’ load, was AOB’s actual vision for the attack. I think that’s crazy and I just want Ponga playing as a fullback. A fullback-*** fullback. For years the line on Ponga has been that if only he had better halves and didn’t have to shoulder so much creative load we’d see him play more like he has in Origin with better halves setting him up. Well, now’s the great chance to see that. If he’s not keen on playing like that and it causes him to want to leave, well, Fletcher is right there.
You don’t say, “no, we can never have Ponga linking play through the middle third”, especially when we get a roll on and have a lot of time and space he can very effectively pick the right option. But Ponga on the ball when we’re trying to earn that roll on? I think that takes away so much from what actually makes him a good player. I believe AOB’s biggest recurring mistake with the attack is constantly trying to change the kind of player Ponga is, turn him into some imaginary “complete” player to justify our investment in him. We’ve seen by now it likely is possible to do that with Reece Walsh, but I just don’t think that’s the kind of player Kalyn is. Kalyn isn’t a lead playmaker IMO, he’s a strike weapon. We want others setting him up rather than him setting up others.
