Players drop like flies over the NRL tragic round

Like I said mate, they can only play the team that shows up on the day. We fielded a 2 rookies and a whole bunch playing their first season against Souths, where's the excuses for that? None. We had to blood another rookie on Friday along with these 3-4 gamers and got the win. 6-9 games so far have been against real contenders for the Broncos and it showed. Those days are coming for your boys and they would want to be better than they are going right now.

You keep spuking mate, your mob have played 2 top 8 contenders this year and they've haven't shown anything close to the Roosters and Storm. Last week you only just got over the Panthers and they're travelling worse than the Broncos. You better get used to the also-ran tag because that's about ol' Clint's high water mark these days. By 2020, Bennett will be retired on 'Maximus' money along with Sam. The Burgii bros return back home for their retirement gig and Walker finds a home at the Broncos. Then your boys will be back to 2017 standard while the Brisbane team are just hitting their straps.

"Before you get too dismissive of Manly and Cronulla, you forget the same Sharks team beat Melbourne the following week and the Panthers the week previous." The Sharks dropped fill in rookies Kennedy and Mulitalo who were replaced by Josh Dugan and the more experienced Si Katoa. Feki was injured and replaced by the far more experienced Aaron Gray. Also, the Sharks gun young forward, Briton Nikora replaced the very average Scott Sorensen. Additionally, Kyle Flanagan replaced the injured Shaun Johnson AND the Sharks had the benefit of taking the full 17 they had trained with into the game without two last second disruptions through injury. Remember, the Sharks lost Feki anf Johnson through injury against the Broncos and played 15 vs 17 with 2 rookies who were on tilt! Meanwhile against the Panthers a week earlier Dugan, Johnson, Feki and Nikora were all fit and played. As for the Manly vs Broncos game that saw Manly reduced to just 14 men against 17 well, if you call that a fair contest then no wonder the Broncos struggle each week playing against a full 17 man squad. ;-)

"there is no where to go but down from 3rd" Well there is up. Souths are currently 2nd on the ladder by a mere 8 points differential but equal with the Rorters on 16 competition points. At present the Rabbitohs are one of only 3 teams that have a realistic chance of winning the premiership with the Raiders a hit and miss chance depending on which Raiders side turns up on the day. Face it Nat, the Bennett era of success is over. ALL of the Broncos past success hinged on "Papa Smurf" who is now calling the shots at Redfern and laughing at Seibold stumbling from loss to loss. LOL

They would have to play 4 Sundays to 34K fans at Brookie. And the Suncorp surface would still be in better nic.

How long did you just spend writing to state the bleeding obvious? I'm not one bit excited about the way the Broncos are travelling and it's a weird concept. Unlike the Young Henry's mob, we are accustomed to success so to see them playing so poorly is hard. You guys have missed the last 2/3 finals campaigns, the Broncos have only missed twice in their existence so any comforting words would be appreciated. You must have a slew of excuses for failed seasons, there's been so many. ;) Before you get too dismissive of Manly and Cronulla, you forget the same Sharks team beat Melbourne the following week and the Panthers the week previous. Manly came into that game with 2 wins on the trot without their stars. The Broncos can only play the team the opposition put forward and neither game was a close fought affair was it? They are young and will get better. You fellas better ride this high because there is no where to go but down from 3rd and no one gives respect to a prelim finals appearance.

Ouch! You've had a lot of time to work on your banter Nat since the Broncos have been at the bottom of the competition for most of the season thus far. The bitterness is starting to show. Perhaps you should change your diet and give up the sour grapes? ;-) Seriously though Nat, a word of warning before you get too excited about the Broncos 3rd win from 9 games. The Broncos were coming off 4 straight losses before they came up against the injury riddled Sharks at Suncorp stadium. The Sharks were missing 6 players (Moylan, Graham, Woods, Nikora and Dugan who pulled out late and they lost Shaun Johnson early in the game). An estimated $3.5 mill on the sideline. If that wasn't a big enough obstacle to the Sharks chances the two rookie late replacements (William Kennedy and Ronaldo Mulitalo) had about the worst games I've seen from a rookie in years. Let's be honest Nat, the North Sydney Bears Canterbury Cup side could have beaten the Sharks on that night. Then there was the "Magic Round" 16 point rout of the Sea Eagles. 17 vs 14 for much of the game and backrowers playing in the centres, a proud win that one against "the walking wounded". Again, the North Sydney Bears Canterbury Cup team could have won that game as well. If not for the Broncos good fortune to come up against two decimated sides in rounds 7 and 9 they would be on 7 straight losses and 1 - 8. Now get ready for reality to set in Nat. This week you play the "red hot Roosters" or is that the "hot Red Roosters"? The Roosters are 8 - 1 (just like the "red hot" Rabbits). Following that the Broncos play the Warriors in NZ who are 3 - 2 at home. So in the next 3 weeks the only certain 2 points for the Broncos is the round 12 bye, and even then they could struggle. LOL

It's ours for 2 more years mate and it was goooood. The 'Pride of the League' have their own oval and a dedicated Centre of Excellence. Now they've reduced it to 5k capacity, you may have a sell out.

If you jump, you'll catch it

Could the wrong positon be due to the ground though? At the speed the game's played now a slip or lack of burst caused by the ground giving can put you well out of position. Though on the flip side I thought hammies and fractures were typically less surface related but happy for a physio to overrule that one. Either way I'd rather see something more concrete in terms of data and you'd hope the NRL (though it is the NRL) would have been watching surface movement like a hawk as it was the obvious risk (and why a country town magic round is probably pretty tough).

Rude

Nrl Physio believes it’s more likely Rapana damaged his PCL in previous tackles and that it simply gave out while chasing the kick. I don’t see what he’d have to gain by making things up.

I rest my case https://mobile.twitter.com/nrlphysio/status/1127495483583111168

Are you serious. That's so worse and will lead to so many more injuries

Would a typical NRL player have preferred to be playing on Suncorp on Sunday night after a full round of footy or at Brookvale oval on any day with only NSW Cup being played first?

It's a conspiracy

Did you actually watch the games or did you just look at the numbers, and decided to find a convenient scape goat? 1. If you watched the games you would have seen that pretty much all the leg injuries were due to impact from other players, not the surface. 2. The number of injuries is broadly inline with averages from other rounds. 3. The number of injuries is broadly inline with recent seasons. Yes the field did look a little tired in yesterday's game, but still in better shape than Brooky pretty much ever. Check out NRLPhysio's posts on Twitter re injuries he covers cause, severity and historic relevance, and does a damn good job.

Pretty much all injuries were related to players getting themselves in the wrong place to make a tackle or having the tackle move unexpectedly and catch them off guard, like Manly's Sipley. Jordan Rapana "perhaps" and "maybe" Latrell Mitchell but nothing conclusive in any case. I expected MUCH worse despite the natural injury toll which was high but NOT related to the deterioration of the surface IMO. And as the grandson of the former head curator of the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney, I'm an expert, "genetically speaking". ;-)

I have to give credit where it is due, to the head curator and ground staff at Suncorp stadium. I was expecting the surface to look much, much worse by the 8th game in 3 straight days but it was still in decent, if not great shape. It rained for a couple of games as well which could have made things worse, but it didn't. So no smoking gun then and I did try to find fault. So job well done Suncorp. I looked closely at each of the games for signs that the deterioration of the ground was contributing to injuries but found nothing conclusive. Jordan Rapana "perhaps" and Latrell Mitchell "possibly" but the latter looked more like a freak natural accident. The rest of the injuries all were game and contact related. That said, I am still not a fan of the concept. It is fraught with danger for the possibility of injuries if the weather had been worse. It is not reasonsble to put the surface of any stadium through such extensive and prolonged abuse and not expect injuries to happen. Also, IMO crowds were low for earlier matches which were treated at times like reserve grade warm up games only to have the bulk of the crowd arrive later for the "main game". Perhaps next year they could split "Magic round" between ANZ stadium and Bankwest stadium? Or better yet, the NSW government, in conjunction with the NRL, could finally build the Rabbitohs THEIR OWN purpose biilt stadium just like they have done for the Eels and are in the process of doing for the Roosters? Wouldn't that be something? Finally, "the Pride of the League", the most successful and oldest original club would have a home and no longer be homeless!

Was always going to happen at Far North Brookvale