Sydney Roosters coach Trent Robinson has hit out at Ricky Stuart’s recruitment strategy and criticism of NRL coaches who complain about losing players to State of Origin.
The Canberra coach said during the week that fellow mentors who grumbled about losing players to representative football were talking nonsense.
While Robinson had five key players unavailable for Sunday’s 24-16 loss to the Raiders, Canberra were missing only Josh Papalii.
Given the Roosters were among the teams hardest hit by Origin selection, Robinson appeared to take Stuart’s comments personally.
“Ricky recruits this team and he’s built this team to what he wants it to be,” Robinson said.
“That’s up to them to get selected or not.
“They had their chance a couple of weeks ago to play (in the City-Country Origin match) and they didn’t. That’s their team.”
Stuart’s reasoning was that representative players won grand finals, so one measure of a team’s quality was the number of players selected for Origin.
“They’ve been building this team. He said a couple of weeks ago they got chased because of how well they played last year and they’re finding it tough this year,” Robinson said.
“He obviously thinks they’re one of the top teams so that’s their boat, we’ll look after ours.
And a suggestion the Origin period evened things up for teams without representative-quality players was also dismissed bluntly by Robinson.
“That’s what the salary cap’s for,” he said.
The Roosters got within two points of the Raiders late in the second half but the home side responded to hold off the late charge.
Robinson said the Roosters had worked hard to develop reserve-grade players into NRL quality and their ability to stand up in first grade was a positive he took from the loss.
“It’s a credit to the way the boys trained,” he said.
“They trained well enough and compete enough to allow some guys to come in and play.”
Lidcombe Oval
Guest
I gather that 9 will never agree to move SOO from Wednesday and the NRL wont either - so the only way is to have free weekends before the SOO and re-schedule game days based on number of origin players teams have to maximise recovery time. There is actually 3 bye's (only 2 where teams are awarded points) the two normal byes and one for rep round which wont happen next year since the Anzac test and City-Country origin are no more. The 3 bye's could be used the way I described or if Origin could be moved to be played say on a Sunday Night(highly unlikely though). Teams selected the previous Sunday - Shortened camps - the 3 byes on the SOO weekend - the following rounds after SOO have the earliest game on a Friday night- 5 day turnaround at least. In relation to player fatigue yes that needs to be factored in and could be by increasing player squads from 25 to say 30 players for the NRL which will mean increased funding to clubs to cover this /increase in cap - something which is up in the air though.
Steve
Guest
Changing the games only weeks ahead of the schedule is stupid. I often plan interstate trips to watch footy and not knowing if I'd be there Thursday or sunday makes a big difference. Players having to back up from all 3 origins would take a huge toll on the players. The only option is stand alone weekends. Play the 9s mid year.
Ron Norton
Guest
Greatest heap ofr sour grapes I've ever heard.
Ron Norton
Guest
Sound suggestion but a little too clever and too much commonsense for those geniuses who make the draw. Your plan would require a little thought and initiative.
Lidcombe Oval
Guest
You were wearing lime green glasses though - some of those first half decisions decided the outcome though - was the bunker on overtime rates-haven't seen as many reviews of an on field NO TRY as there was for Canberra's first try since they could rule on forward passes back in the 2000'S- Every other game this season that's been a knock on - so they have dug another hole for themselves over that decision
Lidcombe Oval
Guest
The best idea is to make the weekend before the first two origins the bye rounds or if possible for all three so no team wont be without their origin players - sure I understand that players will then have to back up on the next weekend from Wednesday but surely the NRL draw can be flexible enough to give teams with more players involved maximum time to recover - i.e these teams play on the Sunday- Friday night game- 2 not affected/least affected teams play / Saturday the next group of teams or have more players backing up than Friday's game but not as many as those to play on Sunday The SOO teams are known in advance so it's not that hard to change game day schedules is it with the Broadcasters etc??
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Guest
Not writing off the Dragons Adam - they've been impressive this year - but I think they might be fighting with the Raiders, Eagles, Cowboys, Penrith, Eels etc for the bottom 4 positions of the 8 by the end of the season. The Dragons and Eagles have certainly surprised on the upside this season. Will be interesting to see if they can maintain their form in coming weeks. I might also be overestimating the Roosters. Still within the realms of possibility of one team sneaking into the top 4 at the expense of the Roosters
Wolly
Roar Guru
He didn't say the Roosters are far better.
Adam
Guest
The Dragons are currently sitting above the Roosters on the table plus rank far better in both attack and defence. Strange for you to say that the Roosters are far better? Even Manly (currently sitting in 6th) have put more points on teams and only leaked an extra 9 points compared to SYD.
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Guest
Agree it wasn't the most scinitillating contest but it was tough and ultimately closer and more exciting than it should have been. The Raiders should have converted their forward domination into a match winning lead by the 60 minute mark. But in the end a win is a win and I'd rather grind out a close win than a close loss. The Sharks, Storm and Broncos are far and away the best 3 teams in the comp followed by the Roosters but we are not even at the half way mark.
db
Guest
Geoff, the flipside of Perenara's performance was that he did his best to assist the Raiders in the first half with some dubious calls. As you say, in the second half, when Canberra looked like they may run away with the game, the Roosters began receiving penalties for things that were not deemed worthy in the first half. None of this takes away from the fact that both teams were average. The Roosters dropped too much ball early in the tackle count and the Raiders seem to lack the offensive penetration that characterised their performances from the second half of last season.
Steve
Guest
The comments don't really line up with the context of the article, I assume his comments and the article haven't been linked together correctly. I agree with the fact that the salary cap is the competition evener, not teams being punished for having origin players. Imagine if we went to the AFL this week and said "okay Adelaide, Geelong and GWS", over the next 2 months you need to play 3 games without your best 5 players and then ask them to back up after playing on Wednesday. Why? Because you have the best players in the competition. It's absurd logic. We are rewarding average teams and creating a more even competition by lowering the standard of games.
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Guest
We must have been watching different games Max. From where I was sitting I thought Henry Perenara did his best to bring the Roosters back into the contest with 7 straight penalties in the second half. He was getting an awful spray by all and sundry in Bay 55. But others might see it differently. In the end the Raiders did enough to beat the Roosters who were missing 5 players to Origin. You can say that based on recent form a full strength Roosters would flog the Raiders given this result but it's not always the case. Often it is who turns up better prepared on the day. Lots of water to flow under the bridge before finals footy with injuries and form and they could end up playing each other.
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Guest
Ricky was basically reiterating what he said last season in that he would love to have as many as possible of his team playing origin because that experience is priceless come finals time. In other words coaches with a lot of origin players may pay for it in the short term but will benefit in the longer term. Robinson made a fair point re Stuart refusing to allow his players to be represented in the City/Country game but its doubtful that strong performances would have led to origin selection anyway.
kk
Roar Pro
Robinson's Roosters got the rough end of the pineapple on Sunday. There will be no further clashes in the H & A season 2017 season and with the usual injury rider, on what has been produced to date Easts at full strength would beat Canberra's best in a canter.
zim
Guest
Not sure robbo understood what stuart was talking about regarding origin. Hasn't even covered the basic point of stuart's comment.