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The Newcastle Knights made a strong effort but could not defeat the Canterbury Bulldogs on Saturday afternoon, slumping to a 14th straight loss.
» Click here to read our full match report
Final score
Knights 14
Bulldogs 28
The Newcastle Knights face a tough home assignment this Saturday against the finals bound Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs. Join us on The Roar from 3pm AEST for live NRL coverage.
The Knights have lifted themselves from being putrid to being ok over the last month. They’ll be disappointed they didn’t get over the Raiders and ran the Storm close in a great game at this venue three weeks ago.
Nathan Brown has been given patience and support from the club and its fans to rebuild from the foundations up, looking for incremental improvement. There are some small slivers of hope for the fans showing too, with the development of younger players like the Saifiti brothers Jacob and Daniel, alongside Jack Cogger and fullback Jake Mamo.
Now for a taste of the present.
Newcastle has lost 13 games in a row. Their points differential of -401 is roughly equal to the combined differential of every team from positions 8-12 on the ladder. Their points scored total is less than the Melbourne Storm’s points differential. Their average losing margin is 21 points.
And this week, they face a Canterbury team that needs to keep banking wins if they want a top four ladder finish.
The Bulldogs tend to just get the job done in games like this – no mess, no fuss executions that don’t run up the score or particularly make them look like world beaters. The Bulldogs have some seriously important games coming up in the run home, most importantly against Brisbane and the Cowboys.
Des Hasler will be expecting his men to take care of business in Newcastle and moving on with a minimum of disruption. He’ll also be expecting some better discipline from Josh Reynolds, who put his spot in the team at risk with his tripping exploits last week.
At team selection, some seasoned players come in for the Knights in the shapes of Jarrod Mullen, Pat Mata’utia and forward Sam Mataora. Josh King and Jack Cogger are out. I’ve liked the look of Cogger. He’s a very green 18-year-old halfback and Nathan Brown is very carefully dipping him into the world of first grade.
For Canterbury, the side named on Tuesday saw the significant kilos of Greg Eastwood swapped out for the significant kilos of Tony Williams. Eastwood has a hamstring concern and this gives Williams the chance to prove he has a future at NRL level after a fairly long stretch of missed potential.
Prediction:
Usually this is the part where I’d try to make the case for both teams to try and convince you that your team may have a chance. But let’s not waste each others time.
Bulldogs by 24.
Join us from 3pm AEST for live coverage on The Roar.