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It’s nice to wake up this morning knowing that the South Sydney Rabbitohs are headed to the grand final, but upon reflecting I have a few thoughts on the game.
Firstly, there were a shade above 50,000 people at ANZ Stadium on Friday night but it looked to me like 45,000 of them were Souths supporters.
Now, I like to joke about how the Roosters have no fans but, seriously. If their fans aren’t going to come to a sudden death semi-final in the middle of Sydney then I have to sincerely ask – do they actually have that many?
Secondly, I will admit I was nervous about this game. The Roosters are a dangerous team and Souths have a history of losing the week before the grand final. What I noticed though was that an awful lot of commentators and professional experts seemed to be tipping a Roosters victory based on their form.
What was I not seeing?
The Roosters only just won in Round 26 due to the Rabbitohs playing without their halfback. Then the Panthers beat them the first week of the finals and the Cowboys almost stole the second week from them. This didn’t seem to be an example of a team with form. It left me confused.
What I saw was a team that had the potential to bleed points in the second half – as Friday night proved yet again. Mitchell Pearce admittedly has hit a purple patch in terms of form but it certainly wasn’t enough to get his team over the line.
So why were the media so quick to treat the Roosters as favourites?
Thirdly, hardly anyone seemed to consider the benefits the Rabbitohs would get from having a week off. It seemed clear to me that even if the score was tight at halftime the Rabbitohs would blow the Roosters off the park in the second half because they were fitter and less fatigued.
This seems obvious. It wouldn’t matter who the team was, the week off is a huge advantage. Yet again, it was hardly mentioned.
So I started watching Friday night’s game with a sense of anxiety that my Rabbitohs would be beaten by their arch enemies, even though my instincts told me they should win. Due to the overwhelming amount of support the Roosters were getting from the experts, I didn’t trust my instincts and I assumed there must be factors I didn’t know about.
Turns out my instincts were right.
Adam Reynolds made a huge difference to the Bunnies and when they went into the sheds at halftime all tied up it didn’t really matter. They just had to batter the Chooks into submission in the second half.
The only way the Roosters could win this game would be the same way they did last week – post a huge lead in the first half and defend it in the second.
Now this is not a post where I’m trying to gloat about how I picked the result when the experts didn’t. I don’t really care. And besides it would only be worth gloating if I’d had the guts to post my thoughts before the game.
I’m writing this post because I’m genuinely confused about how so many experts could get it so wrong?
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