View from the Couch: NRL grand final

Must we? Really? OK – let’s do it. Congratulations to the Eastern Suburbs Roosters (none of that Sydney Roosters rubbish here).

Sing it with me…

“I said Oh, Ah, Oh Yeah
Oh, Ah Roosters
Oh, Ah, Oh Yeah
Oh, Ah Roosters
We came to play, yeah we came to play, we came to play
Hear what we say, yeah hear what we say, hear what we say
We made them pay, yeah we made them pay, we made them pay
Who won today, Roosters, who won today, Roosters
Give me an R, R, double O, STERS
Give me an R, R, double O, STERS
ROOSTERS”

I guess spelling all of ROOSTERS is a bit tough.

Easts versus Manly
For the majority of NRL fans that have followed the game for a long time and don’t actively support Manly or Easts, having a preference for this grand final was a bit like deciding whether you’d prefer to be stabbed or shot.

Neither option is particularly appealing, and both teams give the other fans plenty of reason to dislike them.

In the lead up to the biggest game of the season (since the last biggest game of the season, which was probably Origin 3), Roosters coach Trent Robinson refused media access to one of the biggest names in the game, $BW.

Crowds and TV ratings have both been down this year, so what a top way to support the league there Trent, although I guess did save us from learning how many different ways the question “Will you be playing league next year” can be phrased.

Then there is Mitchell Pearce who is a favourite North of the Tweed when it comes to Origin time, but the bane of NSW supporters’ existence.

Their list of famous supporters includes crooks like John Ibrahim, Mark Arbib, the Packers and Harold Larwood.

And Manly are, well Manly. Fans that refuse to dirty themselves by crossing the Harbour to support their team. There is their long history of buying premierships and they complain and moan like there’s no tomorrow.

There were even stories during the week that league needed characters like Geoff Toovey. I disagree, one whinging, moaning, twit displaying appalling sportsmanship is more than enough.

The last thing you’d want to see as a player on grand final day is that you’d have to play in 33 degree heat, but that was what confronted the earlier games in the day where the Sharks shocked everyone by winning a trophy by fielding a NSW Cup side stacked with first graders.

Those that love to hate Phil Gould (not mentioning any names, Phil Rothfield) won’t be happy with signs that his reign at Penrith is bearing fruit with both the Panthers feeder teams, the Windsor Wolves and their U’20’s team featuring in the earlier games with a 1-1 record.

In the nontertainment (nontertainment meaning pre event “entertainment” that by rule, rarely is – entertaining that is) Jessica Mauboy dressed as a banana was bizarrely supported by a troupe of Stormtroopers, before Ricky Martin made his appearance.

The pre-match guff lasted longer than the game itself with a liberal helping of Tom Waterhouse.com.

Finally we got to the big game, and I have to say it was worth the wait after the last few grand finals have been fairly one-sided.

First half was a half of two halves.

Manly dominated early proceedings after recovering from the shock of seeing Glenn Stewart reel out of the first tackle and stumble around like he’d been seriously injured.

Kieran Foran forced a dropped ball from $BW before setting up the first try for Jorge Tafua.

Just when it looked like Manly might run away with the half, the Roosters fought back, had the flow of possession and fought back to nudge themselves in front.

No sooner did Gould say “this is Origin quality” than the NSW halves did their best Origin impression with Maloney dropping the ball as cold as a spud.

Any “luck” available in the first half in the form of refereeing was flowing towards the Roosters – the refs ignoring a hair pull on Neolithic man – David Williams and Warea-Hargreaves getting away with a cheeky head butt on Justin Horo.

Matt Ballin committed the unforgivable sin of giving away a penalty on the kicker on the last tackle.

The penalty was questionable, but there is absolutely no benefit in arrowing in and attacking the kicker – so why run the risk?

Perhaps the head gear was cutting off the blood supply to his brain.

In the 2010 grand final the Roosters lead the Dragons 8-6 at half time and got rolled 26-0 in the second half.

Again leading 8-6 at half time in a grand final; if the Roosters were nervous that history was going to repeat itself then they started the second half in the worst possible way conceding back to back tries as common sense went into battle against the rules.

Jamie Lyon was cynically tackled without the ball by Mitchell Aubusson while he was chasing a kick. Common sense tells you that when professional fouls like that are committed that justice dictates that it should be a penalty try.

The rules, however, that have been adjudicated on all year and for many years have been that a penalty try is only awarded when the player is absolutely certain to score a try.

There is no way that Jamie Lyon was certain to score in this situation, yet a try was bizarrely awarded. It should have been a penalty and a sin binning, not a penalty try.

The Roosters were rattled by that piece of misfortune and conceded another try almost immediately to trail by 10 and the ghosts of 2010 were coming back.

It was tempting to write the Roosters off at that point, but to their credit they were able to regroup and bounce back on the back of $BW who had a terrible first half but more than made up for it in the second.

The Roosters received their own piece of “luck” leading to a try, to even the dodgy try count to one apiece.

Seems to be a rule that if $BW is involved in a play, then the forward pass rule doesn’t count anymore.

Last week they got away with one against the Knights, and again in the lead up to Shaun Kenny Dowall’s try that took the Roosters to the lead, there was an obvious forward pass from Maloney to Minichello; obvious to everyone but the four referees watching the action.

In a season where the Roosters conceded eight penalties a game on average and had won the penalty count five times in 26 games, it was remarkable turnaround to only concede two penalties in the grand final and win the penalty count 5-2.

Manly fans will certainly have seen something sinister in the final turning point in the game.

Cherry-Evans put up a bomb on the Roosters line, only to see two Roosters players change their ‘line’ to block Jamie Lyon from contesting the kick. That has been a penalty 29 weeks of the year, yet in the decider, apparently that rule has changed.

The deserved penalty would have tied up the scores, instead six tackles down the field, Jennings scored his miraculous try (that had Penrith fans asking where was that effort the last three years?) to seal the game for Easts.

So congratulations to the Roosters.

They looked cooked for periods in both halves, but were able to bounce back. Manly might complain about the ref, Toovey certainly did, but they were in the driver’s seat at 18-8 in the lead and will feel that they let it slip and this is one they let get away.

Can somebody explain to me how on Earth Daly Cherry Evans won the Clive Churchill Medal? I can only assume that Tom Waterhouse had something riding on the result as Evans did nothing.

His team didn’t win and he wasn’t even the best player on the losing team.

In the overall scheme of the game, Maloney was far more influential and $BW bounced back from his horror first half to almost single-handedly drag the Roosters back into the game with a couple of bursts and a trademark offload to put Maloney into the clear.

Neither of those two would have raised eyebrows if they received the gong.

The celebrations followed the usual pattern with the majority of interviewed Roosters players doubting the reality of the situation stating that it was “unbelievable”.

Weren’t they present for the last two hours and involved in the game, can’t they see the scoreboard? It should definitely be believable that in a contest between two teams, that one of them would win.

Perhaps what they meant was “it’s unbelievable we won with Mitchell Pearce”.

That’s how I saw it from the couch – let me know your thoughts in the comments below.

Regards @Armchair_Guru