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    I know Grahan-Taufa is moving on. But he's been a loyal servant to the club and has toiled away in reserve grade. He deserves a run in first grade.

    Hopefully, we will get some stability in that position towards the end of the season.

    Good to have a team naming Tuesday. It's been a long two weeks. Let's hope it's closed out with another 2 points this weekend.
     
    You think Ali’s quickly slipping down the pecking order? Maybe a bit more than a few work ons? Surely not(hope not). I still rate him as our best centre, I know he still has a few things to iron out.
    Not sure, I've just noticed Kayliss makes far better decisions when defending in space. That sort of thing is hard go down a grade and 'work on'. Its almost second nature. He's also more dynamic when running the ball (has speed and step that Ali doesn't have).

    But then i'm not sure how well Kayliss would go at other aspects required from a center, i.e. can he set his winger up consistently or would he be a Solomone Kata out there?

    Bit of a jigsaw puzzle really.

    Berry is still our most complete center imo, just cant master the availability aspect, while Pompey has mastered that and, in doing so, has become the first choice center.
     
    First time I've watched Gannon play on the weekend. He scored a solo try one off the ruck (albeit against some pretty tired players in the 79th minute) showing a quick turn of foot and a step to beat a defender from about 15-20m out. For the first half of the game he was quite involved, ran well and broke a few tackles and got a few offloads away. Seemed to drift off a bit in the second stanza. His stats were - 109m gained, 1 LB assist, 3 offloads, 1 try, 5 tackle breaks. 29 tackles, 6 missed.

    Small sample size but overall was impressed with his speed, ability to bend the line and break a tackle. Looked dangerous on most possessions he had.

    Definitely see why he is being discussed as a ball playing lock. Nice passing game. Got a good offload away around the corner of a defender to get a LB assist.

    6 Missed tackles 2 games in a row is a worry
    This post was in the recruitment thread. I decided to watch myself and do a play by play (not every tackle, not every run but most of it).


    From the replay of Leeds Vs Warrington Wolves yesterday (two big name clubs in the Super League).

    Our man Gannon's club Leeds have had the wood on Warrington however lost their last clash again'st them.

    Leeds coached by Brad Arthur, Warrington coached by Sam Burgess.

    Gannon named to start in the second row wearing number 16.

    Match highlights per my sideline eye: (note a break down of his missed tackles in bold).

    00:00 Leeds kick off, Gannon is part of the chase pack that gets to the receiver 1st, almost gets done by the receiver in the same Fashion Barnett gets done on kick chase but helps herd the runner into the other two tacklers, makes a tackle from behind.

    Missed tackle 1.
    01:40 Gannon gets caught by his team dropping the ball on attack, Warringtons number four steps him clean, Gannon throws out a desperate arm clocking up a missed tackle. To be fair it was an impossible position to defend.

    Gannon settles into his work, making his share of stock back rower tackles.
    0:530 Leeds half comes from the right side of the field in a Taine Tuapiki styled against the grain run, looking for runners, Gannon comes flying up in support, unfortunately is used as a decoy (he was in the clear) but Gannons run it sets up the next runner to tear off down field.


    Kid has a big footy IQ. in the same passage of play pops up on the inside of the runner looking for that pass again no pass....or would have been Try time Gannon.

    Very good game overall, Leeds line speed is good. Gannon with a bit of footwork at the line, goes nowhere but he can move on his feet, throws a wild stand in the tackle offload...been a busy period for him.

    0:930
    Gannon is the main target for their halves as far as their left side raids go, they keep looking for him, gets a pass, stands in the tackle and passes it around the back of the player, pretty slick. I thought there was a hint of it drifting forward, Refs say no flat pass.
    He is not a Dylan Walker on this limited evidence, he is more a ball playing offloading type (Sonny Bill and no I am not saying he is the next SBW, just playing style).

    Missed tackle 2
    10:00
    Gannon dives at the ankles as third man in, helps trip the player who is finished off but Gannon bounces away. So nothing wrong with his tackling there, it was desperate grass cutter dive that made the contact needed.

    11:59 Big front on spot tackle, I thought his mate did as much damage, commentator calls for Gannon BIG SHOT.

    12:10 Charge down by Leeds, our man Gannon catches the loose ball, good one percent play there.

    13:00 Leeds continue to look for Gannon who takes a good meter eating run.

    13:10 kicked on the last, Gannon gets to the receiver and drops him near their try line

    16:10 The Leeds right Center Harry Newman does another Taine Tuaupiki, looking for runners as he cuts from right feild to Gannons left edge, Gannon puts himself in the passing lane, takes the pass, spins in the tackle, gets a lovely ball away to his left....Rhinos go down town threatening in attack....Gannon proving to be very cocky with second phase gambles.

    16:35 Gannon used as a link man for the left flank stands and passes a couple in the Oppositions red zone, Leeds on attack, Gannon tackled after a short run, gets in between the tacklers enough to ensure a fast play the ball, Leeds go close to scoring off the next play (cut down short).

    18:03 Missed tackle 3.
    Gannon puts his hands on an already tackled player and decides to let him go and get back in the Defensive line instead. Nothing to see on this one either.

    21:45 Gannon with a legs tackle that stops a try under Leeds posts.

    25:30 Leeds having survived eighteen plus tackles on their line (Gannon making his fair share) counter attack from within their half, Gannon screams up looking for the pass, while running a slight angle to beat his man, Gannon looks left and right, sees support player on his left, hits the target with a conventional pass.

    Final minute of the half, a Tradesman run, good post contact meters quick ptb. Last five seconds gets a ball, beats his man with footwork, dragged down just short of the line, gets hit with a high shot, penalty Leeds.

    All in all a pretty busy half for Gannon who plays the full forty (has been a bench player). Looks good out there, a key player in this Rhinos attack.

    Half Time.

    Missed tackle 4
    Early minutes after half time....
    Gannon comes in as third man decides to let go of the players legs before held called so he can get back to the defensive line because two players have them held up top.


    42:50
    Gannon hits a hole looking for the pass, gets used as a decoy. Goes into dummy half and passes back in field. Looked threatening if they had of put a flat ball in his lane.

    A much quieter half since the Thirteen for Leeds came on and took over as the dominant ball playing forward (name is Cameron Smith) can see why this Smith has the gig over Gannon, he plays through the middle third with Sam Lisone, and scores two Try's.

    59:30 Gannon on the burst, gets stopped on the spot, takes a bit to get him down. I can see why he can offload, he holds his feet well in contact. Will be something when he is older and more muscled.

    59:50 Warrington drop the ball but get a boot to it before it hits the turf, ricochets off Gannon's foot and fly's upward, Gannon with good hands takes the loose ball and flicks it on instantly to his left setting up a sweeping play for leeds down the left touch line.

    63:50
    Leeds with a left edge shift Gannon with a linking touch to send the ball on.

    64:35
    Leeds kick chase beaten by the Warrington receiver, makes a half break before being cleaned up by Gannon.

    68:10
    Kick chase Gannon makes a dominant tackle leaving the fullback on his back after driving him back a meter

    69:50 Missed tackle 5

    Gannon comes in as third man, nowhere to grab on and stick so his arms come off the back of the player, recovers and takes his legs out.

    Another 'technically' missed tackle that is a non issue.

    78:20

    Gannon takes a ball in the opposition red zone at speed, left foot step shreds a tired poor looking Warrington defence to score a try.

    Missed tackle Six:

    Hell if I know, couldn't find it, might be when he touched a held players shoulder before the Ref had called held.....

    Conclusion:

    Good player, good game, loads of skill, very young, only his third game this season.
    Brad Arthur doing us a favor by playing him at left edge backrow meaning he played eighty minutes.

    As noted above, quiet half apart from that nice Try, frustrating in a way but I can see why they changed the game plan to go through the front door with Cameron Smith and Sam Lisone.

    He won't get a resting second half of a game in the NRL (not his fault Warrington were cooked and running down the other side of the field plus the game plan switch that he is not part of).
     
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    …it is, and then you read about Capewahs growing tally…
    Depends on how they count the misses .Thats why defensive misses can be misleading.
    EG Capes does a lot of kick chases & is first to the catcher but does tackle him but slows him down or makes him change direction & the second chasers/chaser grab him does that mean a missed tackle against Capewell.
    Hence my theory of stats being misleading SOME of the time
     
    To be fair the Broncos fans are right, everybody hates them including me.
    They are a good example of the Tribalism in the NRL, the QLD team vs the rest yadda yadda.

    Also when they were under Bennett their Salary cap looked smelly (basically the Origin side). Their fans are reknowned for being arrogant.

    We (you and Mr Brownstain) are talking across purposes.

    I agree that the Warriors enjoy neutral fan support. Unlike the Broncos fans. That accusation of behaving like them is not me.

    Also I said I did not agree with everything the original poster said.

    My point and the original posters point was in regards to the Australian coverage of the Warriors.

    You and Mr Brownstain are talking about fan perceptions.

    The Original poster who Mr Brownstain called a victim was talking about the tone of the Australian media.

    You yourself have posted many times that the Australian medias job is to concentrate on Australian perspectives and that Kiwis need to deal with it.

    I said that they do this and I said "Rightly".

    Which is why I also said I do not agree with everything the Original poster said.

    However Mr Brownstain has a history of calling people victims when their opinions do not align with his own world view....which in this case was frankly wrong.

    As the Original poster claimed the media over there will talk about our achievements with an Australian spin on them. This is no different say to the New Zealand habit in Union our more successful code of saying our coaches overseas are why those countries have done well.

    This is a fact, they do say RTS brought his Roosters standards to the Warriors (a point the original poster 'victim'lol made)

    The Aussie Media do talk about the Warriors benefiting from the Penrith influences here.

    This attitude is as old as the competition itself....as Rabs Warren said back in 2002 during the intro for the Sharks vs Warriors semifinal "has there ever been a more despised finalists in the history of the competition".

    Personally I like the rhetoric, I like all their tribal "Origin is the highest form of the sport" bullshit coz like Blockers "the big Warriors forwards are tiring " or like (insert random Fox Sports expert) will say when the Warriors win "Their big pack is hard to contain and that unpredictable style they play throwing offloads is a winner" .

    Bottom line, their fans over the ditch like us, their Experts in their media talk about us through an Aussie lense fact.

    No posters should be called out as victims by Mr Brownstain for an opinion about the tone of the Aussie media, because that is un called for.

    Let me be very clear here, I do not think the Aussie media hate us either....I think they are indifferent and apathetic because we have been so poor for so long, that it is beyond them to take us too seriously....apart from those pockets where we are flavor of the month.

    And I am cool with that, does that make me a victim?

    Anywho on matters of recruitment, I am finding it really hard to get any Superleague coverage of our guy over there.
    To be fair the Broncos fans are right, everybody hates them including me.
    They are a good example of the Tribalism in the NRL, the QLD team vs the rest yadda yadda.

    Also when they were under Bennett their Salary cap looked smelly (basically the Origin side). Their fans are reknowned for being arrogant.

    We (you and Mr Brownstain) are talking across purposes.

    I agree that the Warriors enjoy neutral fan support. Unlike the Broncos fans. That accusation of behaving like them is not me.

    Also I said I did not agree with everything the original poster said.

    My point and the original posters point was in regards to the Australian coverage of the Warriors.

    You and Mr Brownstain are talking about fan perceptions.

    The Original poster who Mr Brownstain called a victim was talking about the tone of the Australian media.

    You yourself have posted many times that the Australian medias job is to concentrate on Australian perspectives and that Kiwis need to deal with it.

    I said that they do this and I said "Rightly".

    Which is why I also said I do not agree with everything the Original poster said.

    However Mr Brownstain has a history of calling people victims when their opinions do not align with his own world view....which in this case was frankly wrong.

    As the Original poster claimed the media over there will talk about our achievements with an Australian spin on them. This is no different say to the New Zealand habit in Union our more successful code of saying our coaches overseas are why those countries have done well.

    This is a fact, they do say RTS brought his Roosters standards to the Warriors (a point the original poster 'victim'lol made)

    The Aussie Media do talk about the Warriors benefiting from the Penrith influences here.

    This attitude is as old as the competition itself....as Rabs Warren said back in 2002 during the intro for the Sharks vs Warriors semifinal "has there ever been a more despised finalists in the history of the competition".

    Personally I like the rhetoric, I like all their tribal "Origin is the highest form of the sport" bullshit coz like Blockers "the big Warriors forwards are tiring " or like (insert random Fox Sports expert) will say when the Warriors win "Their big pack is hard to contain and that unpredictable style they play throwing offloads is a winner" .

    Bottom line, their fans over the ditch like us, their Experts in their media talk about us through an Aussie lense fact.

    No posters should be called out as victims by Mr Brownstain for an opinion about the tone of the Aussie media, because that is un called for.

    Let me be very clear here, I do not think the Aussie media hate us either....I think they are indifferent and apathetic because we have been so poor for so long, that it is beyond them to take us too seriously....apart from those pockets where we are flavor of the month.

    And I am cool with that, does that make me a victim?

    Anywho on matters of recruitment, I am finding it really hard to get any Superleague coverage of our guy over there.
    First time I've watched Gannon play on the weekend. He scored a solo try one off the ruck (albeit against some pretty tired players in the 79th minute) showing a quick turn of foot and a step to beat a defender from about 15-20m out. For the first half of the game he was quite involved, ran well and broke a few tackles and got a few offloads away. Seemed to drift off a bit in the second stanza. His stats were - 109m gained, 1 LB assist, 3 offloads, 1 try, 5 tackle breaks. 29 tackles, 6 missed.

    Small sample size but overall was impressed with his speed, ability to bend the line and break a tackle. Looked dangerous on most possessions he had.

    Definitely see why he is being discussed as a ball playing lock. Nice passing game. Got a good offload away around the corner of a defender to get a LB assist.

    6 Missed tackles 2 games in a row is a worry
     
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    Never seen this before, but would love to know if it has happened before. Both the NSW cup and Jersey flegg teams singing the team song togther:

    View: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DK3rSkmh3SQ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
    Sorry for those who cannot view it. Its directly from Cameron George's insta account which normally is not reposted anywher else. Also interesting to see bunty introducing the flegg side to the new song. At least i assume thats the case with the flegg side just standing there as the NSW cup side erupts.

    Putting the comp on notice, this club has changed, we're now united from top to bottom with the best culture in NRL.
     
    Never seen this before, but would love to know if it has happened before. Both the NSW cup and Jersey flegg teams singing the team song togther:

    View: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DK3rSkmh3SQ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
    Sorry for those who cannot view it. Its directly from Cameron George's insta account which normally is not reposted anywher else. Also interesting to see bunty introducing the flegg side to the new song. At least i assume thats the case with the flegg side just standing there as the NSW cup side erupts.
     
    I do not agree with everything he says but he has a point and any non self righteous NRL apologist will acknowledge the Warriors are (rightfully) the outsiders in the Australian NRL narrative.
    This is exactly how broncos dickhead fans thought/think about their club competing in the comp.

    Moral of the story: dont act the same like those fans. You are creating your own narrative. The Warriors are well liked in Australia. We would like to keep it that way thanks. Travel well and travel far. Insular 'us v them' mindset limits ones growth.

    Edit : agree with locking Metcalf up.
     

    While I am on my soap box ranting about McFadden.....

    The genius of the club returning a Warriors coach and giving them the recruitment keys is that they are finally breaking the cycle of under achievement.

    We all know that the Warriors hire people to run the team, and that from that comes some good innovations, and a lot of bad.

    Then they fire that guy and rinse and repeat....

    That is the entire failed history of this team we love, hire a coach, get some good from them, lots of bad, and fire them before they can take those lessons and apply them.....go round and around repeating the same mistakes.

    By hiring McFadden Mowhawk finally released us from the cycle of failure (I am not a Mowhawk sycophant, I do not even like the guy, credit where it is due, he did good this time).

    McFadden as a Warriors coach was the first Aussie coach able to teach these guys how to run an Australian attacking structure. McFadden was the one that brought in shapes, out the back door plays, and NRL structures.

    So he actually knew the way to bridge the gap between the technical Australian systems and the New Zealand raw product - this guy did what Daniel Anderson and Ivan Cleary could not.

    So skip forward to today. McFadden brings in as many Aussie halves as we can afford, the reason is obvious, he knows from his time here as headcoach that the undergrades of the club need Aussie structures to bring out the best in the Kiwi athletes running off those structures.

    Cappy has literally identified that having as many Aussie undergrad halves as possible means the super talented NZ running player gets ball in structure and therefore is more likely to learn and show they can carve the opposition off a world class set up and platform base.

    This is Cappys real genius, all our Raw kiwi kids are getting the same exposure to Aussie environments as they would normally seek by pissing off from NZ and bypassing the Warriors to get the Aussie education offshore.

    Now the Warriors are looking at offering the best education in junior football in the NRL thanks to McFadden bringing in all these Australian spine players to give these kids of ours a Penrith and Storm like Junior platform.

    The Warriors are truly headed for an era of winning in our current set up. No joke, we have the Staff to finally fix this club.
     
    Listened to Healey's interview on sports nation where he was questioned directly about the family being back in Aus scenario. He mentioned that his partner is hopefully planning on moving to NZ at the end of this year. Pretty good indication he's at least committed to seeing out his current contract.

    On retaining Metcalf, certainly worth an upgraded contract offer if he is on around the 500k mark. However the Nicho Hynes scenario is a perfect example of a player getting blown up in the media and ending up falling well short of expectations after signing a massive contract.

    For the first time I can remember I have huge faith in the club to handle the negotiations in a way that's likely to get a good result for both the club and the player.

    Worst case scenario if he does decide to move on. I back the pathways system to bring through a strong replacement option.

    Great time to be a warriors fan.
     
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