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The Brisbane Broncos are no chance of winning the premiership this season unless there is a fundamental shift in their psychology.
This may seem a spiteful stab in the wake of a poor loss to a hapless Bulldogs team, but I’ve thought this for some time now.
If I were asked to sum up the Broncos in a word it would be ‘negative’. I saw the dark clouds of negativity looming through their almost successful finals campaign of 2015: they were getting into winning positions through the talent of a fantastic list of players, before trying to shut the opposition out with 20 minutes to go.
This was repeated in their memorable grand final loss to the Cowboys, where their negative play invited an inspired North Queensland back into the fight.
Instead of learning from their experience going into 2016, they exaggerated the procedure. Kicking it directly out on fifth tackle from an attacking position with most of the second half still to play became standard fare. I even recall them taking a penalty goal in the dying stages when they were up by 12 in one game.
Early in a season is a golden time to be drilling your attacking plays, boosting your playmakers’ confidence in the process. It’s no coincidence that Ben Hunt and Anthony Milford look confused, as their job is to attack but they’re being instructed to kill the ball.
The highlight reel of the dynamic Milford from the last 18 months would mostly consist of him grubbing the ball over the sideline to kill the play.
The problem harks back to the Dragons’ success in their 2010 premiership campaign. Under Wayne Bennett, the Dragons essentially strangled all-comers out of the premiership race, winning on the back of relentless defence.
It worked that year, but that was an anomaly.
Further, the Dragons have been floundering ever since, well out of the finals race and unable to shake their negative mentality. They seem to be on the cusp of recovery but it has taken six years for any positive signs to show themselves.
I’m not going to blame Bennett for the Newcastle debacle, although they have been the worst team I can remember since his spell there, Nathan Tinkler is squarely to blame for their demise.
Bennett seems obsessed with negative play and I can only think that he’s getting his lines crossed between negativity and patience. One could be forgiven for suggesting that the Melbourne Storm is a negative team but in reality they’re instead patient and disciplined.
They play risk-free football that relies on their defence, but when they get an opportunity to attack they’re happy to take it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Cooper Cronk grubber the ball over the sideline except in the dying moments of a game. I can’t think of them ever taking a field goal with half an hour left on the clock either.
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If you look across all sports, negative play is an anchor for natural talent. Andy Murray, for all his talent, has been dogged by negativity throughout his career and has won fewer grand slams as a consequence. The English cricket team has suffered the same problem through many an era.
It has to be the coach’s responsibility to determine the philosophy of the team. More than anything else this is their role. When I look at the Brocos I see a team exploding with natural flair and talent, but every week they play a suffocating brand of footy, incapable of scoring more than two or three tries.
I’m not sure whether Bennett is growing stale, nearing 800 games as head coach, but the Broncos have to be set free from an unproductive, negative philosophy and allowed to play expansive football.
The only risk they’re reducing at the moment is the risk they pose to the real premiership contenders.
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