From The Couch: Round 15

From The Couch: Round 15

Canterbury Need To Start Again: Canterbury’s performance against New Zealand on Sunday confirmed one thing to anyone who knows anything about Rugby League: the club is riddled with cancer and the only hope of survival is to start again. The club may have faced salary cap strife over the last few seasons but the dearth of talent and the complete lack of Rugby League ability on the field today shows that the club has no ability to identify talent, no ability to develop talent, no ability to keep talent, no ability to manage the salary cap and no plan going forward. 

It is quite clear that anyone involved in the football department has to go. The cleanout has began. There should be nobody left. 

Let’s look at the current roster. 

The following veterans are off contract in 2020. None should be offered a contract for even a single $1. These include Kieran Foran, Aiden Tolman, Kerrod Holland, Marcello Montoya, Tim Lafai, Jack Cogger and Sauaso Sue. Only Matt Doorey should be re-signed and perhaps only because he has not shown enough to let anyone down. 

Dean Britt, Christian Crichton, Sione Katoa, Lachlan Lewis, Nick Meaney, Renouf To’omaga, Chris Smith, Reimis Smith, Jake Averillo, Ofahiki Ogden, Dylan Napa and Jeremy Marshall-King all have deals expiring next year. Reimis Smith, Averillo and Ogden can be kept and given a chance to prove themselves. Averillo actually looks good. The rest should be offered to anyone who will take them as soon as possible and if nobody will, dropped to NSW Cup.

The club has significant issues with players signed to 2022 and beyond.

Nick Cotric is coming to the club next season on a sum that would make the Reserve Bank blush and Luke Thompson is hopefully going to be the next James Graham. These two deals make some kind of sense.

Dallin Watene-Zelezniak, Adam Elliot, Raymond Faitala-Mariner, Josh Jackson, Joe Stimson and Brandon Wakeham getting deals that stretch to at least 2022 does not. Elliot only recently got re-signed. The Bulldogs picked up DWZ and Stimson in the last 18 months for reasons that make no sense with unlimited budget and less with salary cap dramas. Josh Jackson cannot move and is a shadow of his former self now. Heaven knows what 2023 will look like. Wakeham is stuck behind Lachlan Lewis and Jack Cogger, such is his talent. 

There is no way out of this for the Bulldogs if they are going to keep signing bad long-term deals. The club is just too stupid to learn and they are just making a once-proud club an even bigger laughingstock.

Crusher Crackdown Ridiculous: There is nothing more infuriating in Rugby League than a crackdown. It typically lasts about two weeks and involves scaremongering, total overreaction and an amendment to the lawbook that is used only occasionally and more widely ignored. The crackdown on the crusher tackle is just that. It is absolutely a tackle that needs to be rubbed out of the game. There is a major difference though when a player drops his weight onto the neck of an opponent and one that gets caught in a tackle, particularly when a player has backed into the line. The game just needs to actually take a measured approach rather than letting something run rampant and then cracking down. 

Bunker Atrocities and Refereeing Howlers All Too Much To Bear: Refereeing is hard. Being in The Bunker is not. Yet both sets of officials go out of their way to make a mess of the game each and every weekend. It is just astonishing how they run rings around themselves. Tigers fans are rightly irate at some horrific calls. The Bunker was just making it up on Friday night in the Dragons game. It is all too much to bear at the moment. 

Big Papa: There will not be a better chase this year than that by Josh Papalii to run down and ankle tap speedy half Jamal Fogarty. It was a chase of nothing but heart and determination. He is rightly admired as one of the most likable players in the game. 

Uncut Gems: The one player from each club discovered in 2020 who can be a building block for a brighter future. 

Brisbane: Tom Dearden … a half who plays with heart, tackles ferociously and dreams big.
Canberra: Tom Starling … sharp and creative rake who has a very bright future
Canterbury: Jake Averillo … the only player at the Bulldogs with a modicum of speed
Cronulla: Toby Rudolf … relentless forward who can play very big minutes
Gold Coast: Jamal Fogarty … the Titans are paying the wrong half as he never stops trying
Manly: Cade Cust … has some handling issues but can create
Melbourne: Nicho Hynes … sharp fullback who will probably need to look elsewhere
Newcastle: Bradman Best … bullocking centre who is already being mentioned for Origin
New Zealand: Elisea Katoa … runs with plenty of strength, an ideal edge forward
North Queensland: Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow … speed to burn, the fastest player in the NRL
Parramatta: Jai Field … the Eels have not invested in rookies but this half can play
Penrith: Charlie Staines … six tries in one-and-a-half top grade games says plenty
St George Illawarra: Jackson Ford … hard nut who will thrive in the middle
South Sydney: Bayley Sironen … unassuming type but works hard
Sydney Roosters: Sam Verrills … his importance is being shown in his absence
Wests Tigers: Billy Walters … genuine livewire who teammates love to play with

Ranking The Halves: The Top 20 halfbacks and five-eighths in 2020. 

1.Luke Keary
2.Nathan Cleary
3.Cameron Munster
4.Daly Cherry-Evans
5.Shaun Johnson
6.Dylan Brown
7.Cody Walker
8.Jahrome Hughes
9.Adam Reynolds
10.Jack Wighton
11.George Williams
12.Kodi Nikorima
13.Mitchell Moses
14.Jarome Luai
15.Kyle Flanagan
16.Tom Dearden
17.Mitchell Pearce
18.Jamal Fogarty
19.Benji Marshall
20.Kieran Foran

2020 Field Goal Update – 14: A weekend without field goals is a sad weekend indeed. 

Fun Fact #1: Dean Young’s elevation to Dragons head coach has made him along with his father Craig just the third father-son duo to coach premiership football after Don/David Furner and Johnny/Stuart Raper.

Fun Fact #2: Dean Young is now the last coach alphabetically to ever coach a premiership game. 

Fun Fact #3: Neither David Furner or Stuart Raper coached as many games as their fathers. 

Betting Market of the Week: Following Peter Gough making up a rule that it is now a penalty to throw an opponent’s boot, the next rule we will see made up on the run:

$3.50: Penalty to step on a marked number
$3.20: Penalty to look cross-eyed at an opponent
$3.80: Teams will be limited to a maximum of four double-barreled names on the field at any one time.
$1.30: Any dropped ball is a knockon

Moronic Coaching Decision of the Week: Dean Young made an inauspicious start to his head coaching career when he managed to leave Trent Merrin on the bench for the entire 80 minutes, clearly having no idea about to use his interchange rotation. It nearly cost the Broncos. 

The Coaching Crosshairs: The Brisbane Broncos and Anthony Seibold are reportedly on a collision course with the Broncos board set to ask Seibold if he is the man to lead the club forward. Seibold, of course, will say he is … he may not be a great coach but he is not stupid enough to leave $3 million on the table. The Broncos are going to have to fire him but it is unclear if they have the temerity to pull the trigger. We are in for a very big week.  

Rumour Mill: David Furner is reportedly the frontrunner for the vacant Dragons job. Esarn Masters is on the outer at the Cowboys and has been told to look for another club. Bunty Afoa is also set to be released by the Warriors. The Tigers are supposedly leading the chase for Josh Addo-Carr. Charlie Staines is set to test the market with Penrith unlikely to be able to keep him. 

Beard Watch: When bearded players go clean shaven, it is very off-putting. So it was on Friday night when Ben Hunt showed up without any facial hair. 

Watch It: This week we go back to 1990 and the incomparable Terry Lamb. The Bulldogs played the Sharks and Michael Speechley viciously headbutted Lamb’s open hand before falling to the ground and carrying on like a clown. Watch it here.