Welcome back to The Roar‘s NRL Thursday Night Forecast series. Four rounds into the season and we retain a perfect record with respect to tipping the Thursday night games, if not getting the margins correct.

This week we have the first back-to-back appearance with the South Sydney Rabbitohs attempting to bounce back from a (not very) Good Friday game against Canterbury.

Recent form
Rabbitohs fans might want to skip this section. After beginning the season with consecutive big-margin victories, South Sydney have since struggled in the rain against the Dragons in Round 3 and then were annihilated by a Bulldogs blitzkrieg on Good Friday.

At least some part of this is down to injury after the team lost key half Adam Reynolds midway through the second half of the opening game and then former captain John Sutton post-match. Those losses were further compounded in Round 4 as the team played without talismanic forward Sam Burgess after the giant Englishman suffered a frightening neck injury against the Dragons.

With key players on the sideline it was perhaps inevitable that the Rabbitohs would struggle but there is no excuse for the limp performance against the Bulldogs. However Burgess will return this weekend and hopefully he will bring some passion with him.

The Sea Eagles meanwhile have had almost the reverse season to the Rabbitohs. After also being the victim of a motivated Bulldogs forward pack in Round 1 and then suffering through the James Tedesco and Mitchell Moses show against the Tigers in Round 2, the Sea Eagles began to find some form. They claimed a gritty home win against the Sharks in Round 3 and then overcame the Roosters in a scrappy encounter in Round 4.

Overall neither team has any sort of form line to entice punters, so this shapes as an intriguing contest.

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Team Sheet

Sea Eagles	Position	Rabbitohs
Brett Stewart	Fullback	Greg Inglis
Jorge Taufua	Left Winger	Aaron Gray
Steve Matai	Left Centre	Bryson Goodwin
Jamie Lyon	Right Centre	Hymel Hunt
Tom Trbojevic	Right Winger	Kirisome Aua’a
Dylan Walker	Left half	Cody Walker
Apisai Koroisau	Right Half	Luke Keary
Nate Myles	Prop	George Burgess
Matt Parcell	Hooker	Cameron McInnes
Brenton Lawrence	Prop	Sam Burgess
Feleti Mateo	Left Second Row	Chris Grevsmuhl
Martin Taupau	Right Second Row	Kyle Turner
Jake Trbojevic	Lock	Nathan Brown
Lewis Brown	Interchange	Damian Cook
Josh Starling	Interchange	Jason Clark
Darcy Lussick	Interchange	David Tyrell
Siosaia Vave	Interchange	Tom Burgess

For the first time in Thursday Night Forecast history both teams have numerous changes after both were badly affected by injuries and suspensions in Round 4.

Beginning with the Sea Eagles, the obvious place to start is the absence of halfback Daly Cherry-Evans. For any team losing a starting half is a problem but for the Sea Eagles losing Cherry-Evans is a disaster given the expansive role he plays for the team.

Unsurprisingly, given Dylan Walker’s limited first grade experience in the halves, Cherry-Evans has thus far taken on a fairly significant role for the Sea Eagles.

In particular, Cherry-Evans takes a predominate role kicking the ball in general play for Manly. He has recorded 38 kicks thus far as compared to a mere 13 for Walker, with a handful of other players contributing a kick or two here and there. While most teams have a preferred kicker the Sea Eagles’ reliance on Cherry-Evans is at the heavier end of the scale and it will be tough to replace both the quantity and quality.

With Cherry-Evans unavailable coach Trent Barrett has recalled Apisai Koroisau. Koroisau started the season in a two-man dummy half rotation with Matt Parcell but was dropped to reserve grade with Parcell taking on an 80-minute role. Koroisau has pinch hit in the halves before at the Panthers, however it is not a role he is naturally suited to.

One thing though that Koroisau will be able to count upon is having one of the finest playmaking fullbacks in the competition to support him in Brett Stewart. A try-scoring phenom in his early years, Stewart’s game is far more rounded these days with more try assists (30) than tries (26) over the last two seasons.

In addition to losing Cherry-Evans Manly will also be without Jame Buhrer whose comeback from a broken jaw lasted only 20 minutes or so. Buhrer, who was prematurely called up for State of Origin way back in 2013 with less than 40 first grade games to his name, is an underrated player these days.

After that unsuccessful appearance in sky blue he has become, along with several others, a byword for the erratic thinking of the NSW selectors. However over the past two seasons he has in fact blossomed into a fine player and his ongoing absence will hurt Manly.

It’s not all bad news for the Sea Eagles, however, with the return of Martin Taupau to the starting line-up. Taupau missed the game against the Roosters through suspension but was instrumental in the win over the Sharks in Round 3 with an 80-minute, 17-carry, 165-metre, 24-tackle night. His return will bring much needed punch to the Eagles forwards who at times failed to go blow for blow with an aggressive Roosters pack.

For the Rabbitohs meanwhile the big news is the return of Burgess who allows the other forwards to play shorter, more impactful stints due to his colossal contribution in minutes.

Interestingly, Burgess has been named in the front row rather than his normal position of lock with the fiery Nathan Brown retaining the number 13 jersey. Brown and Chris Grevsmuhl (who also earns a promotion to the starting side this week) were arguably the only Rabbitohs forwards who offered much resistance on Good Friday and have been rewarded by coach Michael Maguire.

The match will also see the long-awaited return of Burgess’ brother Tom for his first appearance of the season. Meanwhile, Kirisome Auva’a has moved to the wing in place of Michael Oldfield after playing as part of the forwards rotation in recent weeks.

Finally, Paul Carter has paid the price for four ugly errors against the Bulldogs and has been listed only as 18th man.

What to watch for
After we looked in depth at the Rabbitohs’ kicking woes ahead of Round 4 this week we will look at some areas for improvement for the Eagles. For while they got away with the win on Saturday evening it was not without continued struggles in defence, and particularly left edge defence.

Three of the Roosters’ four tries came down the Sea Eagles’ left edge and it continues an alarming trend for the club. Ten of the 18 tries conceded have arrived either on the left flank or as a direct result of a break on that edge.

Some of those tries have been the natural result of losing the forwards battle in the middle of the field and a subsequent shortage of numbers on that edge.

However on more than one occasion the team has fallen victim to an excellent set play. Indeed, the team has been taken by almost the exact same play by two different teams, the Bulldogs in Round 1 and the Sharks in Round 3.

Helpfully for us this is a play we already highlighted for the Bulldogs versus Panthers Round 2 Thursday Night Forecast. On that occasion, we were highlighting the passing ability of James Graham as he switched the play back from one post towards the other sideline and used his superior passing ability to release Moses Mbye and Josh Reynolds.

However as we can see in the following image Graham isn’t the only big man with sweet timing. In the bottom photo we can see Sharks big man Andrew Fifita also gliding across the posts after being turned inside by the dummy half.

As we move to the next pair of images we can see that as both Graham and Fifita proceed back across the posts to their right, (and therefore the Eagles’ left side in defence), each team’s two halves are loitering in an almost identical alignment off the respective prop forward’s right shoulder.

We can also see that both number 11s – Josh Jackson for the Bulldogs and Luke Lewis for the Sharks – have already run through on decoy lines to hold the inside defenders in place.

In this next image we can see that things are going to heck in a handbasket very quickly for the Sea Eagles defence. On the first occasion against the Bulldogs, left centre Steve Matai was dragged in towards the decoy run of Canterbury right centre Chase Stanley.

On the second occasion he is indecisive, presumably chastened by his bad read on the first occasion. This time he is holding back, unsure whether to go in on the centre cutting back towards the posts or stay out and help his winger Jorge Taufua should James Maloney pass to Chad Townsend with Valentine Homes on the outside.

In the end we can see that in this final image Matai has committed to the decoy runner while Jorge Taufua has also rushed in off his wing in an ultimately doomed effort to try to shut down the play before Chad Townsend can shuffle the ball on to Holmes.

Ultimately though Townsend will shrug off Taufua and then pass off to Holmes who will cruise over in the corner, much as Sam Perrett had previously done so for the Bulldogs.

What these two plays demonstrate more than anything else is a lack of communication and confidence among the Eagles left-edge personnel in defence. While the use of the ball-playing prop and the overload of both the left and right-side halves is clever, on both occasions the final overlap is created because Matai cannot resist the decoy run of the centre.

However it is not fair to single out Matai as even in his absence on Easter Saturday the team still struggled in defence on that edge and once again a propensity for the centre to rush out left poor old Taufua exposed.

This next play, from the game against the Roosters, demonstrates that the rush out tactic is endemic to any personnel the Sea Eagles deploy on that edge.

Already in this first image we can see that Manly are in trouble. With ten defenders crammed into one side of the field, there is clearly going to be a lot of space for Jackson Hastings and Blake Ferguson to operate in.

As the play progresses we can see that Dylan Walker, who was at this point in the game defending at left centre, rushing out to try to shut the play down. However Hastings has moved the ball well and now Ferguson will receive the ball with acres of space to run into, a situation in which there is probably no more dangerous a centre in the game.

As the play unfolds Ferguson and right winger Shaun Kenny-Dowall are headed to the corner as Taufua looks forlornly at yet another two on one. However in this case, Taufua has some support arriving with Brown and Stewart coming across in cover.

In the end, however, it wasn’t enough as Ferguson cut back inside, overpowering Brown and wrong footing Stewart to score.

All three plays set out here came from fairly quick play-the-balls and from a deliberate ploy by the attacking team to overload one side of the field before coming back to attack the Sea Eagles’ left edge. The two similar plays utilise misdirection from the dummy half and excellent ball skills from the prop.

They are all well designed and well executed plays, however in each case the poor decision-making of the Sea Eagles compounded the situation. Look for the Rabbitohs (and every other team) to continue to try to exploit this until Manly demonstrate that they have improved.

First try-scorer tip – Sam Burgess
The big Englishman is back and one can only expect that he will be raring to go. Look for the classic 2013-14 Rabbitohs play featuring a play-the-ball near one post with Sam and at least one other big man (probably his brother George) steaming towards the line in tandem with the dummy half only required to hit the right man on the chest.

Prediction – Rabbitohs to bounce back
Last week we anointed the Good Friday game as a very difficult contest to predict and in retrospect that looks silly. But once again it is very hard to separate these two teams.

Both will be without their first-choice halfback however the loss will be more keenly felt for the Sea Eagles. They will be without any genuine halves at all with a centre convert on one edge and a dummy half convert deputising on the other.

This lack of playmaking for the Sea Eagles and the return of both Sam and Tom Burgess should be enough to get the Rabbitohs home.

Shoe in of the Week
With Sam Burgess returning only a week after that scary incident in Round 3 you can bank on many reminders that he played in the 2014 grand final with a broken face or whatever it was. This will then bring up that other bloke who once played on injured for the Rabbitohs in a grand final as if somehow only Rabbitohs players possess this ability to play injured.