2010 Manly Sea Eagles Headed in Right Direction
After six rounds of the 2010 NRL season, two things are obvious… Manly can again be a force, even without their star fullback Brett Stewart… and the standard of refereeing is getting worse every season.
The Drum
By Dave Keogh
After a shaky start to the year when they led their first two games against Wests Tigers and Parramatta by 20 and 16 points respectively, only to lose both, the Sea Eagles have now won four matches on the trot including last night’s thriller against the reigning premiers in their own backyard. They should actually be leading the comp., undefeated.
They were all over the Tigers both physically and on the scoreboard in Round 1 and I’m still trying to figure out how Robbie Farrah and Benji Marshall pulled that particular rabbit out of the hat. And against the Eels, let’s face it… we wuz robbed! Had it not been for a 5 metre forward pass being allowed to stand, (one of at least half a dozen bad decisions in that particular match), we’d now have a 5 to 1 winning record. In saying that, Manly didn’t stay focussed for the whole 80 minutes in either match and so deserve their current position on the table.
That’s all changed over the last three weeks in particular, culminating in one of the best defensive efforts by a Manly side since Bozo was Coach in the mid to late 90s. Every man and his dog bagged the Storm for losing to a committed Manly side… but they went down by just two points after Champion Storm Skipper Cam Smith missed a sitter conversion from almost in front – a mistake you won’t see again all season. I thought Melbourne played pretty well… not their best, but not that bad either. And what team wouldn’t have been blown away by the whirlwind start by Manly?
Have you ever seen a side more energetic, more fired up, faster at the play the ball and more determined to belt the opposition, whether in defence or when carrying the ball than Manly were last night?
16 points in the first 16 minutes of the match… (and one Jamie Lyon conversion attempt just shaved the outside of the post, so it could easily have been 18). And then when inevitably the tide turned and the Storm had all the ball and all the field position in the second half, the Eagles tackled themselves to a standstill. Just a great effort that sent a message to every team in the Comp. that Manly intends to finish Top Four this year (as I predicted in my last Our Manly article).
The forwards were magnificent… Ballin, Glenn Stewart, Watmough, Jason King, Josh Perry… every last one of them. The young halves, Kieran Foran and Trent Hodkinson were outstanding. Foran in particular was brilliant in every aspect of the game, losing nothing in comparison to his opposite number, Australian rep. Cooper Cronk (who also played great).
Ben Farrar is doing an amazing job at fullback in place of ‘Snake’, allowing Robbo to do what he does best – score tries on the wing. And big T-Rex showed more enthusiasm than I’ve seen from the monster winger, breaking tackles on no less than 7 occasions and tackling with ferocity. Steve Matai belted them out wide and Jamie Lyon continues to inspire in the centres… what a season the new Co-Captain is having! Has to be among the first selected for The Blues this year.
The 2008 Premiers are on the march again. George Rose and Brent Kite should be back for the home game against the Titans next week. And if the Eagles play like they did in Melbourne, that match at Brookie should be a formality for them, particularly with the Titans missing both Scott Prince and Matt Rogers.
As to the standard of refereeing… like a lot of other fans of the greatest game of all, I just can’t believe it. Every game produces at least a half-dozen glaring mistakes, seemingly impossible for a half-decent ref. to miss. It was Archer’s turn to make some classic blunders last night - such as that ridiculous penalty against Steve Matai close to the Storm’s line… it just wasn’t!
Matai gets shouldered by a Melbourne player into another one of the Storm defenders and yet he gets penalised for knocking that player over – just insane!
If everyone else can see it, how can the guy a metre away on the field miss it? The one exception in my book is Jason Robinson… in my opinion, he’s the best by far of the pink brigade. The rest? I wouldn’t feed them.
Keep it up Manly… this season is anybody’s… so it might as well be yours!
To read Dave Keogh’s blog, go to: http://doubledrummer.wordpress.com/
Dave Keogh
Our Manly columnist Dave Keogh has been a professional writer for some 30 years, contributing to publications as broad as Modern Fishing and Outdoor. He honed a passion writing a regular column – Talking Tennis – for The Manly Daily. With a varied history including work as a music industry publicist, theatrical agent, band manager, poet, editor and tennis coach, he found his niche in advertising, and with loads of awards under his belt, Dave went into business on his own and now runs several very successful businesses, including an online community connecting sport-loving people – http://www.doubledrummer.com/ Most importantly, Dave loves sport, and is an avid supporter of The Manly Sea Eagles…