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Most people seem to be focusing on the absences of French and field, and Smiths dip in form. For me, at the moment, it’s the form of some of our forwards that concerns me most. Dupree, Havard and Farrell especially. OK, Faz is getting towards the end of his career, but Havard and Dupree are young lads. At the moment they both seem to be just trundling the ball into the tackle and not troubling the defence too much at all. Maybe they should be made to watch videos of Luke Thompson, to learn how to run a ball in.
Our lack of go forward is giving our halves very little time, and therefore very limited options in attack.

Personally I thought that Havard had his best game since his multiple hamstring/shoulder injuries.
Separately I was surprised to see Ellis on the pitch at the end of the game. I was thinking Peet had him as an unused sub to give him a rest as I cannot remember seeing him on the TV picture?

bertina wrote: ↑Fri Aug 02, 2024 2:43 pm Most people seem to be focusing on the absences of French and field, and Smiths dip in form. For me, at the moment, it’s the form of some of our forwards that concerns me most. Dupree, Havard and Farrell especially. OK, Faz is getting towards the end of his career, but Havard and Dupree are young lads. At the moment they both seem to be just trundling the ball into the tackle and not troubling the defence too much at all. Maybe they should be made to watch videos of Luke Thompson, to learn how to run a ball in.
Our lack of go forward is giving our halves very little time, and therefore very limited options in attack.

Havard made 106 metres last evening, the most of any of our forwards. Dupree 55 metres.

I definately agree that dupree hasnt been as good recently but also think Havard had by far his best game since his injury last season

Havard has been one of our best forwards. He did have a couple of games where his standards dipped, around the time we played London at home, but then he bounced back. He was strong again last night. He's one of those players who plays better the longer he plays, so I think I'd always like to see him starting games, but given how tough the schedule is I can understand the need to balance the minutes of Havard, Thompson and Ellis, even though when it comes down to must win games I'd argue you'd want to be getting at least 60 minutes per game out of all 3 and have them on the field most of the time.

If anything I think Ellis is the one who looks to be struggling a bit over the last few games. He's played longer minutes this year than I think he's ever played in his life, so maybe a rest is due for one of the next two games.

Farrell has been doing fine too. I think he sets such high standards and such an impressive level of consistency that any dip feels like a massive loss of form. He's been doing fine. He's still one of the best back row forwards in the competition. On current form there aren't many players I'd swap him for. He might not be working quite as hard as he has done in previous years but I think that's a deliberate thing because of his tendency to pick up injuries later in the season when going full tilt from the start. You also can't underestimate the importance of his defence. Much like Isa's input was only really noticed when teams started targeting the weakness in Nsemba's defence, I think taking Farrell out of our defence would be just as noticeable.

I'd agree that Dupree's form hasn't been great but that's always been the type of player that he is. Even at Salford he was inconsistent. He's not a match for players like Thompson or Havard in that regard at the moment. He might have a strong game one week then be less effective the next.
It might also be a bit of game management with him too though. You don't want all your middles to go flat out all year because most players aren't capable of that. Only the very best tend to be able to maintain really high levels each week. It might be that come the playoffs we're grateful that Dupree has only been making 6-8 carries or 10-15 tackles in games because he's fresh enough to make a bigger contribution in those games.

I think Thompson and Ellis are our best forwards by quite a distance at the moment.

Walters needs to put some serious weight on in the off season and he could be superb.

Wintergreen wrote: ↑Fri Aug 02, 2024 6:46 pm I think Thompson and Ellis are our best forwards by quite a distance at the moment.

Walters needs to put some serious weight on in the off season and he could be superb.

Sam is not allowed to put any weight on. What do you think he weighs?

Can we have 1 new prop and a second rower next season please, release Cooper, Isa, Burn, Chan & Eseh and bring in 2 big barnstorming NRL players, also how about swapping Keighran for Toby King and Hampshire for anybody

When we speed the game up we look so much better than just playing set for set, but I will caveat that by saying that opposition players do seem to be getting away with slowing our ruck speed down and this has big implications on our go forward.

Jonathon Kerr (JK) wrote: ↑Fri Aug 02, 2024 8:25 pm When we speed the game up we look so much better than just playing set for set, but I will caveat that by saying that opposition players do seem to be getting away with slowing our ruck speed down and this has big implications on our go forward.

All teams do, though, Jonathon. I watch Penrith (or Melbourne) and think, what makes them better than the other teams? And the biggest part of the answer is, I think, they just do everything that tiny bit quicker: the way they run onto passes, the way they're first to a loose ball.