In another round of close results, one club may have snatched victory if they hadn’t lost their bottoms, while one legend of the game was talking out of his – if not that of the Devil himself.

Wests Tigers versus Souths

Has the world gone mad? Well yes, yes it has.

Facing Souths is always going to be a hard task, especially when they have come off a loss, and even moreso when you haven’t beaten them in your last five attempts. Just to make it even more difficult the Tigers had to attempt it backing up five days after an energy-sapping game played in 35-degree heat, while Souths had seven days to recover.

To top it all off there was the distraction of rumours that the Tigers name may not last the week due to court proceedings over some debt and property dealings gone wrong.

A big win for Souths was the only possible outcome, even with Dylan Walker and Chris McQueen being ruled out with injury before the game. When Ben Lowe strolled over after five minutes it looked easier than extracurricular use of a Union-funded credit card. But like Craig Thompson’s dalliances, it all turned sour.

The Tigers came up with the perfect tactic – KO Greg Inglis – which they executed perfectly from the ensuing kick-off. From that point on Souths looked dodgier than an Arthur Sinodinos directorship, while the Tigers grew in confidence and couldn’t be stopped.

I do have to call out Aaron Woods for his gutless tackle on George Burgess, which led to the first all-in push and shove now that punches are outlawed. Bent back while his legs were pinned on the ground, Burgess is extremely lucky not to have suffered a serious injury. The commentators were fine with it, but if the league is outlawing the cannonball tackles then there is no way this kind of tackle can be excused.

The refs let a number of forward passes go, including a blatant looking one from Robbie Farah to Keith Galloway when he almost scored that went unnoticed by the refs and the commentators.

With five or six players put on report for various high shots, how did Ben Lowe escape caution for the high shot of Pat Richards that prevented him from scoring a try? And when is someone tackled? Adam Blair got away an offload after taking two or three ‘steps’ on his knees with tacklers on his back.

Those gripes aside, the Tigers smashed Souths and in the process put a massive dent in the confidence of Souths fans. Without Inglis, the Souths backline looked like a rag tag bunch of offloads from other clubs – which they are. Adam Reynolds not kicking the ball into touch from a penalty early in the second half showed how rattled the Rabbitohs had become.

Even the forwards battle, which Souths were expected to dominate, went to the Tigers. And just when it looked like it couldn’t get any worse it did, with Isaac Luke being helped from the field with a shoulder injury that will reportedly keep him out for up to 10 weeks.

Showing more bravado than brains was Liam Fulton, who was knocked senseless in the first round and sat out the second game before being knocked out again.

During the week he said that he’d been knocked out plenty of time and if he got dementia, he got dementia. One of the effects of multiple concussions is that subsequent concussions occur more easily. Hopefully someone at the Tigers shows a bit more concern for Fulton’s wellbeing than Fulton does.

Brisbane versus Sydney
Leading by eight with five minutes to go is generally a pretty sure formula for success, but Brisbane delivered a terrific example of how to steal defeat from the jaws of victory.

In their first two wins, it was the Broncos’ defence that stood up under intense pressure to keep the opposition out and finish with the match-sealing try. Here, the defence crumbled to allow two tries in quick succession.

Everything but the score was in the Bronco’s favour – 56 per cent of possession, 70 more tackles and a 10-3 penalty count. It’s almost a mystery that the Roosters were in the game at all, but you only have to go back to the ninth minute to find the culprit.

Broncos had opened the scoring then ex-Rooster Martin Kennedy broke the fundamental Guru Rule: “Score six, get to your kick”.

When you score points, you must complete the next set of six and get away a good kick to consolidate. You must not do what Kennedy did and drop the ball in the first tackle on the kick return to invite the opposition straight back into the contest – which the Roosters did with Jennings scoring on the next set of six.

Penrith versus Canterbury
This was one of the matches of the round on paper, with all the talking heads enamoured with the form and potential of the Panthers and the Bulldogs playing themselves into some form the previous week.

It ended up another game with defeat being snatched from the jaws of victory. This time the Bulldogs led by four with a minute to go, and the Panthers neededto travel the length of the field in six tackles.

The Bulldogs managed to concede two penalties to allow the Panthers to go the length of the field. Jamie Soward threw a quadruple cut-out pass to put Kevin Naiqama over in the corner to equal the scores, leaving it to Matt “can’t do anything wrong” Moylan to calmly put the match-winning conversion over from the sidelines.

Cronulla versus St George Illawarra
A local derby is always a willing contest no matter where the teams are on the ladder. If before the season you were to say that this game would be first versus 16th, then you’d have bet the house that the teams would be positioned the other way around with the Dragons in the cellar.

In my Sharks pre-season preview, I wrote: “In line with their thrill-seeking (odd) behaviour, the Sharks have shown that they are serious about going all out for the cash on offer at the Auckland Nines by selecting both Todd Carney and Paul Gallen – two players that the Sharks can’t afford to lose to injury.”

That has proven prophetic as Carney was injured at the Nines and Gallen in Round 1, meaning the Sharks have looked pretty harmless in scoring 16 points over two games. If the club wasn’t utterly demoralised already then the hits kept coming when rising hooker Michael Lichaa confirmed that he’d signed a big deal with the Bulldogs.

Sharks CEO Damian Keogh has complained in the papers about the Bulldogs raiding their players and inflating the market. While I disagree with the practice of signing players in March for next season, I don’t think the Sharks can really complain since their reversal of fortunes in recent years has come off the back of signings from Penrith and the Tigers. They weren’t complaining about loyalty then.

As expected the game was close – yet another game this weekend where the result was up in the air right until the final whistle. Carney’s return gave the Sharks more direction, yet it still wasn’t enough to overcome the Dragons on the back of some acrobatic wingers tries including Brett Morris’s career 100th and 101st.

It was an impressive piece of athleticism by Morris, but Try of the Year? Please! One of the least attractive parts of rugby league is the five hit-ups, then lucky-dip kick routine.

North Queensland versus New Zealand
How are you meant to be able to tip this competition? The Warriors have been dire and were making one of the competition’s toughest road trips, to a place they haven’t won since 2002. And the Cowboys, while not being totally convincing, would still be expected to win this one at home in Townsville.

Last week, the Cowboys were denied a victory on the full-time whistle with Thurston having the ball knocked out of his hands on the try-line. Different week, similar story, with Kyle Feldt just putting a toe over the sideline as he dove for the line in an attempt to pull the match out of the fire in the last minute.

The Warriors break their duck, while the Cowboys retain the title as one of the most frustrating and underachieving teams in the NRL.

Manly versus Parramatta
It must have caused great mirth in the NRL headquarters when putting together the draw to put Parramatta, who haven’t won away from Parramatta Stadium for 601 days, in back-to-back away games against last year’s grand finalists.

There had been some bizarre games this week already, but even without Kieran Foran and with Brett Stewart missing through injury, surely some sanity would return with an easy Manly victory.

Manly ran uphill in the first half and went to the break 10-0 despite Parramatta looking the better. The second half belonged to Semi Radradradradrararara, looking very Eric ‘Guru’ Grothe-like in scoring two tries and setting up another.

Leading by two with a minute or so to go, Daly Cherry-Evans was tackled in goal and a drop out was awarded, securing the unlikeliest of wins since… well only since Friday night, but still pretty unlikely.

Or it would have been, had Watmough not told Cherry-Evans to stay down so the video ref could reverse the decision and award a penalty for Semi Ready-Red-Rooster-radrara slapping him across the chops, triggering the last-minute collapse.

Parramatta deserved the win, but Manly crushed the souls of long suffering Eels fans with yet another last play of the game score this round. When that last kick went up, the worst thing that could happen for Parramatta was for the leaping opponent to tap it down to a support (which is what happened).

If Cheyse Blair had caught the ball, then he was still a couple of metres out from the try-line and would have been held up.

Any other result, time runs out and Parramatta win. So why does the defending winger attempt to defuse the bomb safely by catching the ball with two hands? Why isn’t he attempting to perform an AFL style ‘spoil’?

This has led to creation of Guru Tip #21: “Seconds to play? Punch it away!”

Probably unsurprisingly, Parra weren’t happy with the performance of the referees given the 10-4 penalty count, but copping the rough end of the penalty count is generally an extra burden that falls on the lesser teams.

After the game Jarryd Hayne said “they worked their arses off”, while coach Brad Arthur said “they played their backsides off”. Imagine how they would have gone if they’d managed to keep their bottoms on!

Canberra versus Gold Coast
A 15-degree turnaround in the temperature triggered a 42-point turnaround for the Titans in yet another game that proves that tipping on rugby league is a mug’s game. Recent form and team line-ups go some way to determining who wins, but by far the biggest factor seems to be who has ‘turned up’ ready to put in a committed performance.

The Gold Coast went missing last week, but turned it around in the space of a week despite conceding 15 penalties. Last season it wasn’t until Round 21 in their ninth match that the Raiders lost a home game, yet they faltered at the first hurdle this year.

Next week the Gold Coast play the Cowboys on the Gold Coast. May as well just roll the dice on that one as there is no other way to pick it.

Melbourne versus Newcastle
The last time the Knights travelled to Melbourne in last year’s finals series they left jubilant and triumphant, winning their first game in Melbourne for 10 years and dumping the Storm out of the finals.

That must seem like a long time ago with the Knights not having won since and the immediate future looking quite bleak. Key players Jarrod Mullen and Darius Boyd were missing through injury, questions continued to be raised about the financial position of owner Nathan Tinkler and reports that players are being paid late, and then a scary looking tackle on Alex McKinnon saw him carried from the field on a stretcher.

The game was stopped for five minutes as McKinnon was stabilised, put in a neck brace and taken from the field; the crowd silenced. Cameron Smith could be heard arguing with the ref that McKinnon had caused the problem by ducking his head as he was being propelled into the ground; that it shouldn’t be a penalty and could Melbourne earn themselves a penalty by ducking their heads when tackled.

The Triple M commentators were clearly uncomfortable, but tried to defend Smith saying he approached the refs in a respectful way and was just trying to take care of his players that were about to go on report. Bill Harrigan suggested that perhaps it wasn’t the right time to be remonstrating with the ref.

Get off the fence boys! This wasn’t a spur of the moment thought bubble without realising the seriousness of the situation, it came after five minutes to think about it while of watching a guy being loaded into a neck brace. Cameron Smith may be – scratch that, is – the best player in the competition, but arguing with the ref as he did was a gutter act that came straight from the devil’s bottom.

Melbourne did just enough to stay ahead of the Knights throughout the game and remain unbeaten, while the Knights play the Sharks next week so one of them will notch their first win.

Twitter: @Armchair_Guru