Team List Sharks v Warriors - [Round 14, 2025]

Popped over to sharks forever alot of them in there are quite negative, they seriously do think they are the underdogs, understrength wingers etc I think that big loss to the roosters didn't do them any favour's.
The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. This is going to be a 1-12 pt game either way. No way should the line be 6.5. Great value (though I'm not a betting man).

This game is more important for them than it is for us. Although a loss is never ideal, it's certainly not the end of our top 4 aspirations given our healthy buffer on the chasing pack. If the Sharks lose this, they will be 6 pts behind us and Canberra (2nd and 3rd) and 4 pts behind the storm (4th). With all three teams having a bye next week, top 4 would become increasingly unlikely for the sharks. They also get thrown back into the log-jam of teams from 6-13 on 14 pts fighting for the 8. So this game determines whether they push for the 4 or have to fight to retain their position in the bottom half of the 8.
 
tbf to Jacko, one of those games he got concussed so missed half that game (Dragons game). If you remove that game from the average, his average running meters are closer to 150m which is great for a middle (starting or bench). As for Fish, his last game was a bit poor (76m), but his overall average is ok (around 120m). That's basically the average he had when he played at Penrith. In that system, neither he or Leota were big meter eaters and that was ok because of their back 5. So the role of pack was more defensive oriented. I'd say the same is true for us given that most of our meters also come from our back five. So it's ok to having starting props like Barney and Fish who aren't really big meter eaters and more defensively oriented.

Ford will get 60min from here on, wonder if he's better coming in after 20min or take on the high intensity stuff at the start of the game, either way would be interesting to see if Webby goes for a workhorse for 20-30min ie TSS or an attacking player like Ale for the rest of the year
 
I think we need to win the possession battle and that will go a long way to negate all the sharks attack, not just AFB.
Im picking Kennedy will be getting a fair few contested bombs too after his recent efforts
Yeah bro possession and territory is Websters method.

It is interesting since Stephen Kearney was exactly the same, but people look back on Kearney negatively without really understanding that Kearney was right (there are lots of other factors as to why Kearney failed but the core of what he was coaching was correct).

Like SK there is an emphasis on not making errors. So we don't play a lot of second phase or éyes up' off the cuff league under Webster either - at least not before we are well in their red zone and trying to suck the life out of them.

Unfortunately a big part of our consistency football came from the influence of the Barnett FIsher Harris combo....those guys are really solid players that make few mistakes, and play at a high tempo without necessarily doing barn storming runs or big hits. Nor do they use footwork.

Our model is for super fit (both sides of the ball, tacklers and fast ptb exponents) mobile props and 13s to wear down the opposition pack, which is why Tom Ale is falling out of favor (as did Zyon Maiu’u Maiú) and TSS stocks are rising.
 
Yeah look, im in no way denying he has a history of getting caught out of position.....cause he has and it frustrates me as much as anybody. Hell, odds are we'll see it this week, but i also hate the blanket "winger came off his man, his fault" criticism everytime we get scored on the flanks....if it is just a bad read from the wing then fair game, however if that error came further infield id rather identify that.....as it was in the Rabbito's game.

All wingers are trying to pre empt the overlap hence they jam in if they sense one coming, the better defensive wingers will just hold that little bit longer, allow the insides time to slide or recover.....nothing more frustrating seeing a winger jam in when his insides had it covered, in effect creating an oppertunity for the attack when there was none......and im not denying Dal's a serial offender.....however when its due to an inside error ill defend a winger all day.
Hard to defend against a three meter forward pass:cool:
 
I think that is more the Flanagan era sharks when they had Gallen, Ennis, Lewis, etc. The modern sharks pack really doesn't have many enforcer types. I'd even go as far as to say that the most mongrel player in the modern sharks team is actually their winger (Mulitalo) who won't even be on the pitch tomorrow.

Their style these days seems to be less grindy and more side to side. They rely so much on their outside backs for meters and usually start shifting the ball mid field. Other than AFB, none of their current forwards are big meter eaters. Their other starting prop (Kaufusi) only averages 78m per game. Other than AFB, no-one else lining up for that Sharks pack should have us quaking in our boots.


The last time we played them they tried to use mongrel to upset us.

We were 22-4 down against them after they had incurred multiple infractions for head shots on our players and there was handbags at dawn rough up incident.

Then Kale Iro smashed Dallin Watene Zelezniak in the head, causing the Ref to say that is too many dirty shots in a row, Iro was marched from the field.

We went on from there to win the game thanks to the Sharks giving us a platform to cause an upset off all their mongrel dirty play.

We won that game because of all their penalties and six agains conceded in a highly ill disciplined typical Sharks bogan at home mongrel display, the exact game AFB is trying to incite.
 
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Do you hold out hope that we might click and play 80 minutes?
I certainly hope so. I can also see Sharks blowing us apart. Its not a knock on the team but Sharks at Sharks Park is a formidable opposition. If it clicks for them it could be a bloodbath in the Shire waters. I cant see us blowing a team like theirs apart. We play a very timid and conservative style (not knocking that either) as it does lead to wins.
 
I certainly hope so. I can also see Sharks blowing us apart. Its not a knock on the team but Sharks at Sharks Park is a formidable opposition. If it clicks for them it could be a bloodbath in the Shire waters. I cant see us blowing a team like theirs apart. We play a very timid and conservative style (not knocking that either) as it does lead to wins.
Yeah this games another toughie we could get destroyed here like you said.
But our performance against the Raiders missing both JFH and Barnett gives me hope that we will stay in the grind.
If we manage our discipline and make our tackles there's no reason why we can't win this, on the Sharks Forum they're very wary of us too they think we might blow them wide open.
 
The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. This is going to be a 1-12 pt game either way. No way should the line be 6.5. Great value (though I'm not a betting man).

This game is more important for them than it is for us. Although a loss is never ideal, it's certainly not the end of our top 4 aspirations given our healthy buffer on the chasing pack. If the Sharks lose this, they will be 6 pts behind us and Canberra (2nd and 3rd) and 4 pts behind the storm (4th). With all three teams having a bye next week, top 4 would become increasingly unlikely for the sharks. They also get thrown back into the log-jam of teams from 6-13 on 14 pts fighting for the 8. So this game determines whether they push for the 4 or have to fight to retain their position in the bottom half of the 8.
Sounds good but our poor points differential makes us vulnerable to the chasing pack. Storm should win tonight and Manly's loss good but I think we need a good win against the Sharks to give us some breathing space.
 
I think they will come out clunky and if we can build a lead their princess will choke as usual. Hope Demi gets more minutes for x-factor off the bench as Ford and Leka both likely still starting and Laban/TSS aren’t exactly game breakers in the midfield, I still don’t know about not playing Ale and have 3 rookies(ish) on the bench lol
 
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