My season review
An A minus
Would have been a A to reach the grand final and an A+++ to win it all
Coach:
Webster was outstanding this year in getting a team no more talented than Manly to finish 6th.
Players I am worried about
CNK he is signed to the end of 2027 yet I suspect he is cooked. Particularly from a defensive point of view as he missed a few crucial tackles. Does this mean he is our fullback to the end of 2027?
Positions we need to recruit for
I think we need an extra centre we only had three that webster trusted going into this year and two of them kept getting injured. We either need to sign someone or promote a prospect from NSW cup or a stand out from Flegg.
Green Shoots:
TMM as a bench lock prospect and maybe
Gannon to play lock. I said a number of times we were lean at lock especially if Ern
Clark had gotten injured.
TMM tackled well enough and played well enough last night to be a credible lock - he is as big as Max Plath who frequently plays lock.
Hopes for next year
1) If
Gannon turns out to be a strong NRL player from day one like the Raiders imports have been then this sures up our back row stocks considerably and gives us a better bench. I think the NRL has had a decent hit rate with English Import forwards and a shitty hit rate with English backs with the exception of Farnworth. Case in point Dodd.
2) AKP makes Titans regret they let him go.
Shadows of things from 2025 that could screw us up for next year
If
Metcalf loses two shades of pace and becomes ineffective and
Webster sticks by him out of loyalty and we finish 15th next year.
Where did it all go wrong this year?
I think
Barnett's injury - I think we could have made do without
Metcalf as our points per game was the same before and after his injury. I am really hopeful
Barnett recovers well from his ACL - I think he will as who cares if
Barnett loses two yards of pace over the 40 metre dash. His job is in tight and to hit it up. I see backs as being at risk in terms of their recovery profiles from ACL injuries and not forwards especially so props.
The major lessons from this year
a)
Leka was not ready at any point to play 80 minutes and his mistakes last night came towards the back end of the game. We need to be mindful of our rookies more carefully in coming years from a minutes played perspective.
b) Only having three specialist centres bit us in the ass. see my earlier point. Bringing in
Harper was a waste in time since
Webster never trusted him to play first grade.
c) Wingers who jam and jamming edges defences are high risk
d)
Fish really did pay off in terms of suring up our middle third defence and he alone was a major reason for our success this year vs 2024 and why we won so many of the close games vs losing them closely like we did in 2024. In my view.
e) That we need
Barnett on the field as our captain.
Fish is a good man in the sheds but on the field we did better with
Barnett actively taking charge.
Barnett is an extrovert and was good at getting his messages across. I saw him once talking to a referee and someone else from our team walked up to get involved and
Barnett told them to jog on and the was the captain and would do the talking. The ref seemed to love it and we got good decisions the rest of that match or at least in my minds eye I romanticise that is what happened.
My advice for Webster
Just keep going - I hope you can put your feet up this summer and be happy in the knowledge our recruitment power should be easier this year than after 2024 given our higher finish this year.
I am not sure what
Webster means in his press conference something is missing, A player is missing? Some training from him is missing? Our attention to detail is missing? Our fitness is missing causing us to clock off at the end of games? Whatever we are missing he says we make these crucial mistakes all the time. I hope he knows what we are missing as I don't.
My advice for the fans
Stay the course. Premiership coming soon if we don't fire
Webster.
