Take the Two: Round 18
NRL Round 18 under the microscope
If the beer’s cold and the afternoon’s long enough, we’d be talking footy all day, every day until kickoff on Thursday night. With so much to review each week, let’s break down some of the key plays each week in the NRL.
Sydney Roosters vs Newcastle Knights
It’s getting easier to talk about the Sydney Roosters with every week.
That’s coming from a South Sydney fan with a rabbit on his chest, circa 2014.
This rugby league juggernaut, who’s professionalism surely now rivals that of the Melbourne Storm, is gathering momentum on their way to yet another finals series, and the seemingly allusive - no, impossible - ‘three-peat’ doesn’t seem so unlikely anymore.
Perhaps the simplest way to sum up how well the Roosters are travelling right now is that I’m not even touching on James Tedesco - arguably the world’s best player - in this breakdown.
The truth is, you could write a feature for just about every player in Trent Robinson’s dressing room on Friday night, but we’ll stick with two here this week - Luke Keary and Sonny Bill Williams.
Much has been said of SBW since his return to the NRL last weekend, and while some think the hype is overboard, Sonny Bill’s involvements against the Knights on Friday were first-class.
As we previewed last week, SBW slotted in at lock forward for immediate effect à la the injured Victor Radley, who’s ball-playing through the middle third was integral to the Roosters’ offensive structures earlier in the season.
Midway through the set SBW fills in at first receiver, drawing the attention of three Knights’ defenders before pitching Sitili Tupouniua one-on-one against Mason Lino:
Tupouniua very nearly offloads to Tedesco, who would’ve been off and away. At the very least, he barges over Lino to earn a quick play the ball, and when Jake Friend looks up from dummy half, SBW is there again.
Sonny Bill digs right into the line before releasing a slick cut out ball to Joey Manu, who squares up a retreating Enari Tuala before offloading to Kyle Flanagan in support:
Two simple yet extremely effective involvements from SBW in this set saw the Roosters charge up field and into good territory for their strike players to attack - Nat Butcher had played the ball near the halfway line just two tackles prior to this try.
Almost 50 meters travelled with just a few extra passes through the middle, before allowing Manu and Tedesco to do their thing.
When he wasn’t making inroads in yardage sets, SBW filled his role as a ball-playing lock at set plays with aplomb.
After producing an offload that scrambled Newcastle’s defence and earned Sydney a set restart, SBW sets up at first receiver with the backline fanning out to his left.
With Angus Crichton running a strong decoy line, Sonny Bill holds up Mitchell Pearce before releasing a perfect pass just short of the line to Luke Keary, who now has a 4-on-3 situation against a retreating defence:
Try time.
Keary didn’t have to do much in this instance, but the five-eighth was in fine touch on Friday night as he continued on what has been a stellar season as the Rooster’s primary playmaker in 2020.
He finished the game with two tries, a try assist and two line break assists, but Keary’s solo effort to put Daniel Tupou over in the corner deserves special mention, both here and in Jason’s Play of the Week:
Spotting Pearce is slow to get onside, Keary stands up a sleeping Gehamat Shibasaki at marker to dart down a ridiculously narrow short side, straightens to draw in winger Starford To’a before finding Tupou on the paint with a classy flick pass.
It wasn’t the only time Keary ventured down that short side successfully on Friday night, and we’ll be looking for little trick plays like this against lazy defenders in the upcoming finals series.
With Keary posing a constant threat down the left edge and Sonny Bill Williams distributing through the middle, the Roosters now have ball players across the park who can get the pill to where it needs to go or create attacking chances for themselves.
With combinations still building and enforcer Jarred Waerea-Hargreaves to return, the tri-colours are in ominous form with the ball in hand.
Only Cameron Smith’s masterclass against the North Queensland Cowboys on Sunday night came close to this kind of offensive dominance over the weekend.
Cronulla Sharks vs New Zealand Warriors
The fairytale came to an end for the embattled New Zealand Warriors on Sunday night, as their narrow loss to Cronulla Shark means they can no longer push for a miracle finals appearance.
The Warriors were in it up to their teeth, but ill-discipline gifted Cronulla too many easy passes out of their own end, while some poor decision making in key moments proved costly for an inexperienced Warriors’ spine.
With 12 minutes to go until halftime and down just 4-0, the Warriors were in the arm wrestle and worked upfield strongly through Tohu Harris, who poked his nose through the line to earn a quick play the ball:
Wade Egan senses a chance to scoot and takes it, almost putting Roger Tuivasa-Sheck through a hole back in behind the ruck, but his skipper can’t bust the line. While there’s a case to be made for playing eyes up footy here, it was fifth tackle and Egan had his halfback Chanel Harris-Tavita in position for a kick into the corner.
Instead, Tuivasa-Sheck is tackled on the last, and Cronulla get an easy passage out of their own end and are quickly on the attack.
When Peta Hiku is forced to come in and complete a tackle on Conor Tracey soon after, the Warriors are shot for numbers and pace on the edge and Shaun Johnson makes them pay with a deft grubber in behind the line:
The bounce of the ball certainly favoured Cronulla in this instance, and at the time this try felt a little against the run of play.
But New Zealand fans can’t blame bad luck on their poor fifth tackle option leading up to Ronaldo Mulitalo’s try, nor the penalty given away by Harris-Tavita in the ensuing kick off set - while they seem like small errors in the moment, it was lapses like this that handed Cronulla the game.
Ex-Warrior Shaun Johnson had a night out, finishing with another two try assists to his name as well as a number of stirring individual defensive efforts:
Most believe that the Sharks are simply making up the numbers in the upcoming finals series, but coach John Morris has quietly gone about his work this year to turn this fairly inexperienced squad into a competitive, gritty football team.
It’s easy to forget this is a roster that has lost names like Matt Prior, Paul Gallen, Bronson Xerri and Josh Morris in the last twelve months, while experienced playmakers Matt Moylan, Chad Townsend and Wade Graham watched on from the sidelines on Sunday night.
They mightn’t be up measuring up against the competition leaders just yet, but there’s been plenty to like about Cronulla this season, and their younger players will be far better for the finals experience.
For New Zealand, Tohu Harris shouldn’t expect to pay for a beer if the Warriors manage an end of year celebration in 2020.
The tireless utility forward played 80 minutes in the front row on Sunday night, finishing with 202 running meters and 41 tackles with just one miss.
In a season where he has been used as a running edge back-rower, a yardage man in the front row or a ball playing lock through the middle third, it’s a wonder Harris has lost none of his impact on both sides of the ball:
If only he’d had a little support from a teammate on this run - or in countless others across the season - we might’ve seen the Warriors and Tohu Harris play finals footy this year.
He certainly deserves it.
There’s Always Next Week For…
… the Brisbane Broncos.
It’s more a case of next year than next week for the Brisbane Broncos but still, their spluttering offensive effort against the Gold Coast Titans on Saturday has them featuring in this segment yet again.
Despite finals being out of the question, the Broncos still had plenty to play for in this regional rivalry, after ‘little brother’ Gold Coast took the spoils earlier in the year. But even the return of captain Alex Glenn wasn’t enough to improve a Broncos side that looked desperate for direction and control, particularly in attack.
Young halves Tom Dearden and Sean O’Sullivan have both had promising moments in first grade this year, but neither had any answers to a resilient Titans defence that seemed to spend long periods on their own try line, only to repel lame attempts like this on fifth tackle:
Two individual efforts from David Fifita and Corey Paix were Brisbane’s most likely attacking moments, but both players lost the ball over the line to cruel any chance of a comeback by the Broncos.
This pretty much sums up a woeful Broncos’ offence, which produced just one try through a kick despite having 24 play-the-balls inside Gold Coast’s 20m line, and a weight of attacking possession late in the second half.
In a horror season for the proud Brisbane club, the absence of hooker Jake Turpin through injury has been sorely understated.
While still a developing player himself, Turpin’s control and direction from dummy-half would otherwise be taking plenty of pressure off youngsters Dearden and O’Sullivan, who often looked rushed when calling the shots on Saturday afternoon.
Throw in fullback Darius Boyd, who is still safe as houses when summing up numbers on the end of a backline shift but hardly poses an individual attacking threat to opposition defences, and the Broncos are simply not asking enough questions across the park.
Turpin is a highly creative attacking player, as shown during his extended cameo in the halves last season, and his return to the Broncos’ lineup will surely make a difference to their NRL-low 240 points scored this season.
And then there’s poor Corey Oates.
It’s hard to imagine moving an out-of-form player between positions would do much for his confidence or performances, and Oates was an unfortunate example of this on Saturday night as he finished the match with four errors and a penalty to his name, alongside a meagre 49 running meters.
At one stage, after moving to the back row, the Broncos had shape and numbers down the left edge, only for the cut-out pass to hit Oates in the head as he overran his lead line.
It wasn’t long ago that Corey was scoring tries for fun down Brisbane’s left edge, and for the Maroons in State of Origin.
Perhaps if given a clear role within the team and asked to simply focus on his job, we might see Oates and the Broncos score a few more points before this very long season comes to an end in Brisbane.