First, why the heck did we not take the points from some of these endless penalties to keep the scoreline ticking over? Jaco has I reckon an 80%+ success rate, so it's an obvious route. Just two pens and we'd have won that game. Seems to me the game plan for the second half was wrong - let the forwards take it up in an arm wrestle and get us a TBP, overlooking that Kings are pretty good at scoring on the breakout, as Warriors and others have found and as inevitably happened.
Two, what has happened to the backs to produce such a limp display? Agree with this:
doedin wrote: ...even with a dodgy ref we should have won that easily. Front row dominated and we had 80+% of possession and territory in 2nd half. However it is patently clear that no-one, including the players, had any faith in our backs. We continue to have no idea about what to do when in the opposes red zone, no set moves, no plays and a lack of skills. Without our back 3 we have no attacking edge and no threat across the backs.
Our backs play relies on the individual skills (on a good day) of a few standout players, rather than an organised scheme of attack involving each and all playing their part. Take away the three star backs, as on Saturday, and we promptly become mince. This for me is a core coaching issue: we will never have 10 standout players, each bringing inherent audacious skills with them. We will have some good, some potentially good, some maybe not so good. Yes, we need to upskill them as far as we can, but far more necessary is to evolve a tactical style and plays that mean the whole is far greater than the sum of the parts.
Nothing in the backs play so far leads me to believe that Hodge has the skills or experience to do that I'm afraid. There are several specialist attack coaches around, who understand the 'variable geometry' of the midfield attack, who write about the many plays the backs need to train for, and who go out to clubs and show them how to do it, in the same way as Ritchie Grey does as a breakdown consultant. I think we need to avail ourselves of one such ASAP, as a few more performances like that and our chances of reaching the playoffs will be kaput.