Think the Knights can pull off a hell of an upset and defeat last year’s premiers? I spoke to one Knights fan, my mate James, who thinks they can.
Shaun: How do you rate Newcastle’s season so far?
James: Up and down, inconsistent. Win one week, lose the next week.
Turn up one week, yeah, inconsistent but they’ve played quality games, up there with the best if they’re on song.
Can they beat anyone?
Yeah, this team can beat anyone.
Did you think Newcastle would make it this far?
Of course, to the finals but… I thought we’d finish higher. But finals definitely.
There was a point where you weren’t going to make the eight it looked like.
Well that’s like the same, inconsistent. We’d win like four in a row then lose.
Halfway through the season we went through like seven loses in eight games or something like that. We’ve got there in the end.
So you’ve made the finals, beat the Bulldogs, were Bulldogs easy beats?
I thought we were always going to win. We beat them twice this year, we got them all over the park.
You play the Storm tomorrow night, you haven’t beat them at all this year.
We could have won both. Should have won the first one, lost the second one with ten minutes to go, in Melbourne, and the second one we were up eight nil. It wasn’t an 80 minute performance but, yeah.
It was 16-14, it was close.
Yeah, that was in Melbourne.
Wayne Bennett said after that game that it felt like a win.Did you say they had a meeting?
Yeah, Bennett held a meeting to address all these issues like we weren’t turning up every week. And then that was our turning point, he’s said it a couple of times since then.
We haven’t won every game but we’ve played a lot better since that meeting.
How long have you had Bennett for, three years?
Two, this is his second year in charge, gradually getting better.
What did you think of the roster when he was buying the older players, were you concerned?
Nah not at all, aww [Craig] Gower a little bit I was (laughter).
But when he brought [Danny] Buderus back I was obviously stoked, he’s one of my favourite players of all time. And Willie Mason he’s been one of our best performers all year.
[Jeremy} Smith, Beau Scott, yeah it wasn’t an issue at all, the older people for me.
The age of those players, signing them, you didn’t worry about it?
Wasn’t an issue at for me at all.
Bennett said he brought them in because he was worried the Knights were getting bullied.
Yeah, the forward pack? Yeah, I was pretty stoked.
So how are Newcastle going to beat the Storm?
Defence, obviously, everyone knows hows good [the Storm] are in attack, Billy Slatter, probably the most dangerous attacking player in the game, Cameron Smith, is the most consistent player in the game.
Hold them out in defence and capitalise on opportunities when we get given them. I think defence is probably key down in Melbourne.
A lot of people are starting to think they can beat the Storm, Phil Gould came out and wrote an article why they can beat them, does that give you more confidence or are you confident all along?
I’m always confident we can beat anyone like I said before, we got to… I think we have one of the best rosters we just got to turn up but like we did against the Bulldogs.
We played 80 minutes against them so, which we haven’t done all year. Against Melbourne we did play 80 minutes and we lost, narrowly so that gives me confidence.
Just back to Buderus, when he left the club, did he leave in bad circumstance, did they not want him? He still had rugby league in him obviously – how could the Knights lose Danny Buderus?
I actually don’t know, I don’t know how he left, I can’t remember, I think he actually wanted to play in England for a couple of years like Andrew Johns did, he planned on retiring over there, but when the opportunity came he came back which is good he’s had obviously injuries but when he’s played he’s been the same old Buderus.
He’s retiring this year.
Yeah, so every game he’s going to play like it’s his last. It’s just a matter of can we progress further?
What about Robbie Rochow? Has he played the whole year?
Yeah he’s played every game, along with Tyrone Roberts and honestly I think he’s Origin back rower of the future, he’s really solid in attack and defence, he’s great, he’s a good player.
Tyrone Roberts, he’s been under some pressure because everyone’s comparing him with Joey Johns, the last time the Knights won a final Joey Johns was playing.
I can’t say a bad thing about Tyrone Roberts, my second favourite player in the team, best dummy going around and he seems to cope with the pressure as well so he’s alright.
Jarrod Mullen, your favourite player? Dally M?
Winner! He’ll be thereabouts if he doesn’t get it. He’s had the best year.
I’ve got some questions here, just your predictions, man of the match?
Jarrod Mullen.
Final score?
Ah, I said defence before, I don’t think it’ll be that high, it could even be 16-14 how it was [in their last game] but Knights way.
Wayne Bennett, your opinion of him, he was at the Dragons and he won a comp with them…
He’s obviously good, he’s made Jarrod Mullen a better player I know that for a fact.
About half way through the season where we lost those seven games I wasn’t happy, I was criticising Bennett, I thought he was a bit over-rated at that time but he’s got us in a great spot at the moment and it’s only his second year, he’s on a four year contract so we obviously progressed further than last year, we didn’t even make the finals but this squad’s – Bennett’s been responsible for brining them together.
Melbourne Storm did you see them against the Bunnies?
Yeah, I thought the Bunnies were just too good, I don’t think Storm were that bad, they had two disallowed tries, I thought the Bunnies won that more than the Storm lost.
Any last remarks you want to add?
Just hopefully get a win and keep going further in the comp, like I said before I think we have the team to win and hopefully Jarrod Mullen wins the Dally M and Clive Churchill.
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