The loser of the Roosters-Eagles clash will be at long odds to make the decider

The chances are high that if you don’t go for the Sydney Roosters or the Manly Sea Eagles that you don’t like either club very much.

As a result, there were more than a few people who were quite happy with the respective losses that both had in Round 1.

This weekend those two widely disliked sides come up against each other.

And history suggests that the side that loses is highly unlikely to even make the 2022 grand final, let alone win it.

For two sides that I was saying were locks to make the 2022 finals series just last week, this is a horrible reality to be facing.

The stats are pretty clear though. Of the 48 sides that have faced off in the NRL grand finals going back to 1998, only five of them have lost their first two games. That is just ten per cent of them.

The list includes:

• The 1999 St George Illawarra Dragons, who lost to the Melbourne Storm
• The 2003 Penrith Panthers, who beat the Sydney Roosters
• The 2008 Manly Sea Eagles, who despatched the Storm 40-0
• The 2011 New Zealand Warriors, who lost to the Sea Eagles
• The 2015 North Queensland Cowboys, who beat the Brisbane Broncos in extra time

Both Trent Robinson and Des Hasler will be painfully aware of the pickle their sides find themselves in and their sides will be desperate to win this Friday night.

(Photo by Matt King/Getty Images)

The first few rounds of any season always throw up a number of upsets as sides we assume would be competitive prove to have dropped away, and sides thought to be strugglers show great advances were made in the off-season.

Of course, complacency can also play a part.

I don’t think the Sea Eagles were at all complacent. I think they were out of their league.

Against the reigning premiers the Sea Eagles looked like rabbits in the headlights. While the Panthers were the most outstanding side of the opening round, Manly barely fired a shot.

It was more luck than anything that had the margin only 12-6 at half time, with the Panthers’ pack dominating their opponents and the outside backs looking scintillating.

The full-time score of 28-6 flattered the Sea Eagles. It could have been 50.

Manly’s stats were dreadful. They made 700 fewer metres, conceded six line breaks and missed 44 tackles. Their forward pack got bullied. Their back line was run ragged.

For many players 157 metres, three tackle breaks, a line break and a try assist is a very good day out. For Tom Trbojevic, however, it’s a quiet day at the office.

The Sea Eagles can not afford him to have anything but a big game. There really isn’t a plan B.

(Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

There was barely a positive to take out of the match for the Sea Eagles apart from the only way being up.

The Roosters were at short odds to make light work of the Newcastle Knights, especially on the SCG with Joey Manu and Luke Keary returning. The Novocastrians had not read that script at all and ground their fancied opponents out of the game in convincing style.

I got the feeling that the Roosters were not nearly as mentally prepared as they might have been. It is hard to believe that would be on Trent Robinson.

It is clear that Adam O’Brien had his charges well and truly prepared for the game. They executed their game plan very well and strangled the life out of the Roosters. Worryingly, with all of their strike power, the Roosters did not make a single line break and they conceded seven. The Tricolours made just 13 tackle breaks for the match.

Again, the positive they can take out of the match is that the only way is up.

Both sides have named virtually unchanged teams for the SCG match-up.

You can bet that Trent Robinson will be aiming lots of traffic at Lachlan Croker, Haumole Olakau’atu and Morgan Harper who shared 17 missed tackles between them against the Panthers.

He’ll also be working hard on Luke Keary, Sam Walker, James Tedesco and Connor Watson enacting the dangerous spine that on paper they should absolutely be.

(Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images)

We can expect a far more focused and determined running attack from the Roosters on Saturday night or there will surely be changes in the line-up.

Similarly, Des Hasler will surely have noted the 19 missed tackles shared between Billy Smith, Siosiua Taukeiaho, Sam Walker and Paul Momirovski.

While there is no question that Tom Trbojevic is up to it, there is incredible pressure for him to reprise his 2021 attacking form ASAP.

However, his ability to do that will hinge massively on whether the Manly forward pack can provide him with the space even a player of his calibre requires.

And that’s really what this crucial match will come down to: who wins the forward battle.

The cold, hard reality is that to beat a forward pack that contains Jared Waerea-Hargreaves, Victor Radley, Angus Crichton, Taukeiaho, Sitili Tupouniua and Lindsay Collins – especially after they’ve been chastened so badly – you really need better cattle than Jake Trbojevic, Lachlan Croker, Toafofoa Sipley, Olakau’atu, Ethan Bullemor, Sean Keppie and Taniela Paseka.

Expect fireworks for the first 20 minutes of Friday night’s game. However, once the smoke clears I expect that the Roosters will beat the Sea Eagles, possibly handsomely, and that the boys from Brookvale will be struggling to keep the pace for the rest of the season.

And they’ll be statistically only a one in ten chance of even making the 2022 NRL grand final.

But most of you hate Manly? So that’s really a good thing. Right?