Round 9: Mum's The Word

A quick trivia question: In a week where Chris Sandow’s decision to switch clubs from 2012 caused tensions to rise between “senior” officials at his current and future clubs, where the NRL was slightly irked by Brisbane’s decision to rest most of their big name players, where an injury to Jamie Soward cast further doubt on to the makeup of the New South Wales State of Origin team, what is the common factor linking each of these stories?

That’s right; everyone involved has a mum. As a tribute to the mums of both Rugby League and tipping, here is the Roast for Round 9 with help from mums around the world.

Australia v. New Zealand – “Because I said so, that’s why!”

While New Zealand again failed to defeat Australia in this annual in-season match, the closeness of this game provided further evidence of the narrowing gap between these two countries. New Zealand did well to stay near Australia for much of the contest, but in the end, Australia was too good.

However, this was not a “classic” Australian victory; as coach Tim Sheens mentioned to the media in post-match discussions, three of Australia’s four tries came from New Zealand mistakes. In other words, Australia ultimately imposed their will on this match and basically decided New Zealand would not take the lead in this contest.

Country Origin v. City Origin – “You’d forget your own head if it wasn’t screwed on!”

This archaic fixture again proved quite intriguing, if only because these teams are assembled just once a season. Despite a lack of depth in some positions on both teams and an obvious lack of familiarity and continuity, this was a fairly high quality game which was decided on one play in the game’s final minute.

However, City Origin coach Brad Fittler deserves a roasting for leaving the ultimately crucial task of goal-kicking to little-used option Nathan Merritt. While the City line-up did not possess a current first-choice goal-kicker for his NRL club, Merritt hasn’t kicked in the NRL since 2008 and his career success rate as a goal-kicker is lucky to be at its current level of 58 per cent.

Statistics say Fittler had little choice but surely one of Hayne, Farah or Pearce would have been more naturally suited to goal-kicking than Merritt. There is no proof of this, but it would be completely unsurprising to learn that Fittler was more worried about trying to make an “inspired” selection (such as Adam Cuthbertson) and gave no thought to a goal-kicker until the last minute.

Still, City had a very good chance to win this game and if Hayne chose to run a little wider around Heighington on his chip-and-regather attempt, he might have drawn a penalty which could have won City the game. Instead, he barrelled straight into Heighington and Uate took the kick back 60 metres for the game-winning try.

Brisbane v. Melbourne – “I don’t care who started it!”

A somewhat cryptic mums’ saying here as the losing Broncos came very close to seeing their calculated gamble (of resting those who played on Friday night) pay off; there is very little scope to criticise the losing team in this instance.

Instead, the mums’ saying refers to the Storm’s strong links and similar path to the Brisbane Broncos. Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy served a long apprenticeship under Wayne Bennett at Brisbane (keep an eye out on old Fox Sports replays for Bellamy running the water for late 90s and early 2000s Brisbane teams), while Melbourne’s sustained run of success almost mirrors that of the Broncos in the late 1990s and early 2000s. If only those old Broncos teams had two sets of books……

Anyway, given their lofty position on the ladder and need to manage the wellbeing of their star players, it was prudent of Brisbane to rest Lockyer, Hodges, Thaiday and Hannant in this game, but it may also have improved their chances of winning. The theory here being that motivation would have been harder Melbourne and their bevy of backing-up players to summon knowing they were playing against a significantly weakened opposition. Brisbane (and their younger than usual team) gave a very strong account of themselves but fell just short of victory.

Gold Coast v. New Zealand – “Do you think money grows on trees?!”

This mums’ saying is not so much related to the game played at Robina on Sunday afternoon but more so to the somewhat bizarre recruitment the Titans are currently undertaking for 2012 and beyond. Sadly for the Titans, their opportunity to win a premiership with their current core of star players looks to have passed them by; now, the difficult process of renewing and turning over the roster without sinking towards the bottom of the NRL ladder has begun.

The importance of the spine – i.e. the fullback, halves and dummy half – is acknowledged across the NRL and the Titans had one of the better spines last season: Campbell, Rogers, Prince and Friend. Since then, Rogers retired, Friend has been injured for much of the season so far and Campbell and Prince are slipping somewhat faster down the slope towards retirement. Given their poor start to 2011, you’d imagine the spine would have been a major priority for the Titans in their player recruitment but this has not been the case.

This is not to say the Titans’ signings are bad players: Jamal Idris and Luke Douglas could have long and successful careers for the Titans. But they don’t fill positions where the Titans desperately need players. Nor do these players play in positions where cheaper alternatives aren’t quite readily available.

Meanwhile, Titans stalwarts Friend and Anthony Laffranchi will be lost to the club; both have many good years left but received pathetic offers from the Titans to re-sign. Obviously money doesn’t grow on trees, but Friend and Laffranchi might be forgiven for thinking that it does (especially if the rumours about the Titans and major salary cap breaches from last season had any semblance of truth to them).

In Sunday’s game, the Titans were missing a lot of their structure without Friend and Luke Bailey, but the Warriors were impressive, winning by 20 points. While only a few Warriors had to back up from Friday night, the team hadn’t had to back up after an in-season test since 2001 (when, coincidentally, they also played on the Gold Coast).

St George Illawarra v. North Queensland – “If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you do the same?”

Despite being hit by a number of injuries before this game, the Dragons were still going to be a tough nut to crack for North Queensland. The Cowbores followed the template many other teams have used this season when playing the Dragons; a very simple game plan, try to play good field position against them, hopefully they make mistakes before you do and then a lead might be possible. If this happens, the Dragons become much more beatable.

But the Dragons have only lost one game this season, despite losing some forward punch (which would seem to hurt their chances in low-scoring games) and their defence was brilliant again in this game. They held the Cowbores out for close to 4 full sets of 6 tackles before an intercept led to a 90-metre Brett Morris try. Soon after, the now emboldened Dragons scored again, with Stanley finishing off an entertaining sequence.

Playing the Dragons in a slowdown game doesn’t feel like the equivalent of jumping off a cliff, but its success rate suggests the two events are not that dissimilar.

Manly v. Canberra – “What part of no don’t you understand?”

As the weather worsened during Monday, Canberra’s chances of ending their long losing streak improved. However, over the weekend and into Monday, their chances of winning fell back with news of a seemingly rejuvenated Learoyd-Lahrs unavailable due to injury as well as the late withdrawal of Josh Dugan with an upset tummy (the actual reason given for Dugan’s absence was only slightly less pathetic than this one).

Despite these absences, Canberra had a lot of good attacking field position in the first half, a noteworthy accomplishment given they were running into the wind and Matt Awful’s weak kicking game. But they never really looked like scoring. Canberra’s conservative game plan and lack of confidence in attack meant they never tested the Manly defence, despite much possession, so when Manly took the lead and looked much more likely to cross the line, this game was decided early on.

Eat your vegetables and see you next week.