The first abbreviated round of the 2018 NRL season has come and gone, with some teams losing their way and others hitting top gear, even without their Origin stars. Here are my talking points from Round 13.

Take it to the bush
There is not nearly enough first-grade rugby league played in rural areas.

To put it nicely, country areas in both New South Wales and Queensland have been treated with disrespect by the NRL and rugby league in general over the years.

The annual City versus Country fixture – farcical as it might have been towards the end – was thrown on the scrapheap this year, and while extra games were shipped to country areas to make up for the loss of the representative fixture, more should be done to ensure rugby league stays two steps ahead of other sporting codes in the bush.

Rounds like this, where there are no Origin stars and crowds tend to stay away from games in Sydney are the perfect opportunity to take games to towns starved of first grade rugby league.

Sure, there will still be the knockers that say things like ‘no Origin stars and now you take games out of the city? How does that fix anything?’

And to an extent, the knockers will have a point, but for towns who are only going to get a single game per season, there is a seriously small chance they are going to turn their nose up at it.

Whether Origin players or not, first-grade players are still the best we have in this country. The development clubs can do during those weeks in country areas – whether running signing sessions, training for the kids, opening the doors to their own training sessions or doing other community-related activities – are invaluable to the game and it’s development in those areas.

I’ve always been a believer that every club should be forced to take at least one game per season to the bush – and yes, that includes teams like the Brisbane Broncos and Melbourne Storm.

When you look at crowds for this round, it’s flat-out embarrassing.

6,172 for the Sea Eagles and Cowboys on Thursday, 10, 410 for the Rabbitohs and Sharks on Friday, 7,719 for the Eels and Knights on Saturday and, at the time of writing, an unpublished, but looking like it’ll be low crowd figure for the Roosters and Tigers on Sunday.

Why on Earth do we need to play these games at ANZ and Allianz Stadium? It’s a stain on the game to see empty grandstands and no atmosphere at grounds which can accommodate 80 and 40-thousand respectively.

Does anyone want to debate those pathetic figures wouldn’t be beaten in country areas?

If depth is a key indicator of premiership chances, then the Rabbitohs are favourites
If you think about premiership-winning or grand final teams, they have all had fantastic depth. Sure, some luck is required when it comes to Origin, but if you’re at the top of the ladder mid-season, you’re going to lose players to Origin, and if you don’t have the depth required, it’ll hurt.

It’s why the Origin period, frustrating as some fans might find it, has become the competition’s great leveller over the years.

Think about teams like the 2010 St George Illawarra Dragons, various Brisbane Broncos teams or even our last two premiers, the 2016 Cronulla Sharks and 2017 Melbourne Storm. Heck, the Cowboys last year are probably the best example of the lot in terms of having depth and how it can help during the second half of the season.

This year, we are seeing two teams with great depth – the Penrith Panthers and now the South Sydney Rabbitohs.

I’ve talked about the Panthers injury crisis and the way they play in this column previously, so let’s focus on the Rabbitohs for now.

They were missing four of their star players on the weekend and put in one of their best performances of the season against Cronulla. With no Greg Inglis, Damien Cook, Dane Gagai or Angus Crichton, the Rabbitohs were up and about from the moment the first ball was kicked.

Their defence set the tone, and their attack followed. The Sharks battled to get it out of their end for the entire 80 minutes, despite being close enough to full strength with only Valentine Holmes in the Origin arena and Josh Dugan out through injury. South Sydney didn’t let their foot off the gas, with players like Robbie Farah and Hymel Hunt buying into the system Anthony Seibold is employing.

Depth is one part, but the Rabbitohs are playing a consistent style, which is direct and led by the Burgess brothers.

A club like the Roosters meanwhile, who were always going to have problems beyond their top 17 this year, put in an uninspiring performance as they beat the Tigers.

The Rabbitohs depth was tested on the weekend, but it overcame its first assignment and will be starting to make believers out of fans of the famous club.

Believing that just maybe, 2018 is going to be their year.

Kalyn Ponga is a superstar
The Newcastle fullback has been on fire in 2018. Many questioned Newcastle when they signed the youngster to a long-term, mutli-year, multi-million dollar contract, but there are no questions anymore.

Without Mitchell Pearce, he has become the teams lead playmaker and it showed on Saturday as he stamped his dominance all over a 30-4 victory over the Eels to keep the red, white and blue within striking distance of the top eight.

After 13 rounds of action, Ponga is leading the Knights in most key statistics by a considerable margin. He has 12 try assists and 3 of his own to go with 22 goals. He is averaging 117 metres per game from just 12 runs, has nine line breaks and 72 tackle breaks at more than five per game and a handful of offloads.

When you consider all of those numbers to go with just 17 errors in 13 games – only one per game with four left over – it’s an incredible effort. They are numbers you would expect to see from a veteran, not a fresh-faced almost rookie.

Newcastle have been up and down, granted, but Ponga hasn’t. He has been consistently their best performer week in, week out, and anyone doubting his ability to take over from Billy Slater at State of Origin level next year must just about have rocks in their head.

The Sharks need Josh Dugan fit and healthy
There were plenty of problems for the Sharks on Friday night in their first loss for seven weeks, but if one stood out more than others it was the lack of a strong, ball-running fullback.

Josh Dugan gets criticised to the hill and back because of his inability to set up plays, and fair enough. In the modern game, fullbacks must be able to ballplay – like Ponga has been doing for the Knights or Billy Slater has done for years at the Storm.

They set the example and others try to follow their lead.

Yet, Dugan has never been that sort of player and some settings, it’s exactly what teams need – a fullback who can just run and run. The Sharks, with a halves combination doing enough on the creative front over the last six weeks, have used Dugan’s influence at fullback well.

He has over 100 metres per game, but more importantly is averaging ten metres per run. If there’s one thing you can bet on, it’s that Dugan will always get sets off to a solid start.

With the South Sydney defence muscling up on the weekend, Cronulla were missing that impact and so, it was hardly a surprise to see their six-match winning streak come to an end.

Is it time for Ivan Cleary to bring Josh Reynolds into the Tigers starting 17?
It’s time to face facts for the Tigers. Benji Marshall, as much of a club legend as he is, has fallen terribly out of form and isn’t fitting into the team balance any longer.

As well as the Tigers started the season, the club have fallen horribly out of form, winning just two of their last seven matches.

While Wests may not have the parts floating around to restore the team balance and give the side a true organiser – which is a roll Luke Brooks needs to be playing – Reynolds impact off the bench flipped the script for the Tigers on Sunday afternoon in their eventual loss to the Roosters.

Reynolds injuries this year have hurt the Tigers, with Cleary then forced to bring him back through the bench due to the once strong form of Marshall.

It would hardly be a surprise to see a change next week. Whether Marshall is retained on the bench is anyone’s guess, but the impact of a fresh half seems to work for the Tigers.

It’s just that they can’t afford to continue starting slowly and the fresh half off the bench should no longer be Reynolds.

Where to now for Parramatta?
It’s somehow getting worse for the last-placed Eels, who got blown out by the Knights at home on Saturday evening.

While they finished the game with no one on the bench through injuries to Bevan French, Mitchell Moses, Will Smith and Peni Terepo, their big loss to the Knights was simply inexcusable.

Brad Arthur’s job isn’t going to be called into question just yet, given what he has been able to do with the club rebounding from off-field issues in seasons gone by, but the pressure will start mounting on the head coach in the near future if the Eels can’t turn it around.

It now looks as if the season could well be over for Moses with his knee injury, but then, Moses isn’t going to do a great deal to help their defence.

It’s extremely hard to know where to look moving forward. The club have issues both on and off the field and at the moment, are consigned to the bottom of the table. It’s going to take a major reversal in form if they are to avoid the dreaded wooden spoon with a record of just two and eleven all but ending their mathematical chances of playing in September just halfway through the season.

Regardless, they are still playing for pride. It’s going to start with a need to get back to basics, defend their line and try not to be blown out. Brad Arthur needs to instill some respect into the jersey which was missing on Saturday night.

If he can’t do that, then Eels face multiple blowouts over a difficult second half of the year.

Daly Cherry-Evans is a big part of Manly’s problems
As longtime Roarer Eaglejack put it during David Holden‘s blog of Thursday night footy between the Sea Eagles and Cowboys – “Manly literally have no idea what to do past the 3rd tackle. Zero leadership. DCE might as well be in the stands.”

I was going to paraphrase it and say something else, but I couldn’t have said it any better, so there it is in cold, hard daylight.

The Sea Eagles, frankly, were awful at home on Thursday night against a Cowboys side who, while gallant, have shown very little which suggests they are going to be a force come September this season.

Trent Barrett’s men have had some bright spots, like their thumping win over the Eels, but off-field problems and a slew of injuries have put them in a massive form rut as the middle of the season approaches.

The club have won just two of their last seven, and while that included a win over the Storm, it’s a rare bright spot in an otherwise bleak period which has seen their attack fall from pillar to pillar.

Daly Cherry-Evans, who last year had one of the best short kicking games in the competition alongside Blake Green, who played a steadying hand in the halves, has turned into a fragile half who no longer knows how to control his team and the tempo of games.

It’s what Manly did so well last year, with their kicking game leading them on a charge into the top eight by the time September rolled around.

While they couldn’t do much in the finals, Cherry-Evans was virtually in career best form.

Nine months later, and he isn’t recognisable as the same player. While the whole club are on an up-and-down merry-go-round at the moment and Cherry-Evans can’t do it all by himself, they were in some quality positions against the Cowboys at times and couldn’t turn it into points.

To put it bluntly, it’s a major concern for the Sea Eagles, whose chances of finishing in the top eight and playing finals again are fading rapidly.

Roarers, what did you make of Round 13? Drop a comment and let us know.