I like that but am not brave enough to put it in writing…lol

Might as well have a go here too…billy’s 6 fearless predictions:
1. Sharks to finish minor prems and not make GF
2. Corey Norman to win Dally M.
3. Wayne Bennett to be sacked by the Broncos.
4. Ash Taylor to make SOO debut on the bench
5. Hayne picked at Centre for Blues and named Captain.
6. Ivan Cleary named Blue coach for 3 years for 2018-2020

sorry pal – thought you were missing the batman, so didn’t want you to feel lonely.

imo trent should consider moving DCE to hooker – that’s probably his best position.
Uate to HB.

yep – the skipper should be the last one off the ship, not the first.

Jake T and Klemmer play different roles at their clubs than RCG. Jake T is a more creative type prop and Klemmer is your enforcer.
To me RCG is not in those moulds – I would compare him to a Matt Scott or Tolman type, one who you give the ball to and say run at those forward all day and make yards, he does that very well but on the same token, is not yet at the elite level but has all the hall marks at this early stage to be very good.

thanks – but as you may have gathered I am not a fan of selective enforcement.
What happens when there selective enforcement, generally some other area is forgotten about in the race to “speed up” the game.
If a players moves off the mark – penalise them
If a player is offside – penalise them
If a player feeds the second row or lock – penalise them
If a player argues with the ref – penalise them
and I could go on….it would clean up all the rubbish pretty quick.
And while they are at – every time Cam Smith speaks to the refs or tries to referee the game himself – penalise him and sin-bin him for 5…lol

There is a degree of accuracy about the article, however the fact that it is a young team with a few old heads (Tamou and Merrin) to keep them on the right path, I suspect they will meet expectations of a top 5 finish at seasons end.
Will they win the comp? Probably not….but like ’05 Tigers Team, ’16 Raiders teams – there is a helluva lot to like about the way they play.
I can’t see Cleary falling victim to 2nd year syndrome – his pedigree would indicate that. Ivan was one of the coolest heads on the field when he played and young Nathan looks to be just like him.
Even without mansauce there, their backline looks very potent.
If Cartwright learns to be more selective and learn from uncle John, then he provides them with so many options.
I’m not sure about RCG being over rated – from what I see him, he takes it up all day and never shirks his responsibility for a reasonably young front rower.
Peachey will be the star of the show – imo one of the most underrated players in the game.
One thing I would really like to happen for the Panthers, and I know it wont happen, is bring back Luke Lewis for his swansong.

I just don’t get why the refs need to come out and make a public statement that we are going to enforce or be vigilant on x or y rule – if its in the rule book, then it needs to be enforced, end of story.
Now by saying that, I don’t want to get to the same situation as it is in Rugby, where the referee blows the pea out of the whistle (the problem I dare say there is that there are too many rules to enforce) and, in a lot of instances, most don’t know what the penalty was for.
To me, one of the biggest problems with the NRL rule book, is people like the great Gus Gould making stupid comments criticising the application of the rules – “I know the rule book says it, but that shouldn’t be a penalty, let them play” or “let it go, he might have been offside but wow that was great rugby league”.
Like anything to do with rules/law, you may not agree with the rules/law but they are the rules/law and must be enforced – if the rules/laws are wrong, then get them changed, until then enforce them all equally.

Ricky and any other who coach/club have absolutely no right to whinge and complain about the salary cap and how difficult it is to retain long serving players – they are the ones who make the decision to sign new players and throw the long serving players to the wolves.
Why should the NRL make dispensations when a coach changes their mind about who they want on the roster.

The loss of Parker, the heart and soul of the broncos will be sorely felt.
McGuire is said to now be the leader of the pack – its worrying signs when IMHO the biggest grub in the game is seen as their “leader”.
Blair and third man Sam are past their best, but will give sporadic quality games but not consistently enough given their past feats.
McCullough and Glenn are both under rated work horses, but apart from them and Gillett, there isn’t much quality in the pack or on the bench. Highly rated juniors coming through but none have done anything too remarkable at this stage to justify the fanfare.
Their reliance on Milford and Boyd is a strength but could also be their Achilles.
Best they could hope for would 5th, but more likely 7-13 with every 2nd other club.
As a Brisbane resident and non-supporter – I genuinely hope they slide out of the 8. It would be interesting how the local media would deal with that and what excuses and hand wringing would be pulled up.

you are correct with what you say – he didn’t have much to work and something needed to be done, however sacking all those players and therefore effectively removing the 1m that those players were contracted for began (or exacerbated – depending on the view you take) the constant cycle of trying to catch up.
The back office absolutely let the club down the way it went about trying play catch up as a result of trying to consistently build a quality roster with one hand tied behind their back. No excuses for what occurred, but if they had let natural attrition takes it course, it would have been a shorter term fix.
My personal feelings towards him was he sunk the ship and then was first one off it

ST47 I would have thought Twent and the Eagles would be up there, along with moving DCE to hooker.

i can only comment on when attending C-Bus Stadium when eels play titans – its generally 60/65 % eels supporters there.
My guess is it would be similar percentages for other travelling teams except maybe Storm and Cowboys.
Its a bit of p-I-a to get there with no direct rail link or parking anywhere near it.

Out of all your selections, I can possibly argue about one of them:
Ricky Stuart – to me he is over rated, inherited good rosters and both the Roosters and Sharks, got them up for a while but then the inevitable happens and the players stop hearing his seemingly intense message and drop off. His efforts at Parra were the ones that started all the mess , then he ups and leaves.

sstid – tongue firmly planted in the cheek , however its interesting to note that none of those questions have ever been satisfactorily answered by the NRL and entity involved .
As I understand it, the NRL has to vet and approve (if not even register) all TPA’s to ensure they are valid and are not being used as a mechanism to circumvent the salary cap or exploit a loophole. You hear it annually after each audit of the salary cap.
I feel that the reason that the NRL is deafly silent on the whole matter is that they are aware of the scale and magnitude of TPA’s in clubland and are wary of the public and media (read: NEWS Ltd and Hadley) backlash that may occur as a result of the release of the statistics.
It is symptomatic of the way the NRL deal with the issues – player agent investigations, player investigations, fafita affair, the foran issue and so on, Andrew Gee affair and so on. You sweep it away until the public and media forget about it or the outcry becomes so great that they are forced to act and then over react.

like a lot of coaches say – they are a necessary evil.
Every sports competition in the world have “trials” – they may be called different things such “pre-season friendlies” but they are still trials.
You can have as many intra club hitouts as you want, but they will never replace a good old fashioned trial.
Most coaches use the first trial to test out newcomers or youngsters to see how they perform under pressure after all the pre-season work, to see if their new plays will work against the opposition.
The 2nd trial they give their first squad a good hard hitout just to check on combinations and get their players into game decision making mode, rather than pre-season training mode.
So if trials are a thing of the past, why does every club have them…
One thing I would like to see more is the pacific island clashes – Samoa v’s Tonga, Fiji v’s Cook Islands, PNG v’s NZ Maoris etc – those games can be some of the fiercest and most entertaining clashes of the year

joey, I heard their football manager interviewed towards end of last week and he was singing from the same songsheet as Taylor re: no comment on signings, it seems its not JT thing but a organisational view.
When asked by the interviewers his reply was along the lines of “we wont be commenting or discussing anything to do with contracts, next question”.

I like your optimism but I don’t necessarily share it – but that’s what this is all about isn’t it? Opinion.
The fact that I don’t support the team is a part of the reason I don’t share your optimism but if all cylinders can fire I could share your sentiments, but as I said, 12-14 is probably realistic, 7-8 optimistic but anywhere in that range is highly likely.
Looking forward to Rd 1 though….

so both you guys are saying that the quality of the recruitment is better than the quality of personnel that have left over the last season?
Most observers would be of the opinion that the overall quality of the squad from 2016 to 2017 has diminished, but the teams supporters expect that the 2017 results will be better than 2016.
Historical success is but one indicator of future success, its not a guarantee.

The last decade for both the Storm and Manly have been as a result of once in a generation type of player – the Storm have been blessed to have Cronk, Smith and Slater to base their team around for that decade or longer, while Manly have had the Stewarts, Lyon, Matai, Watmough and to a lesser extent, Foran and DCE,
Storm should come back to the pack in the next year or two, whilst its now for Manly. Rebuilding after such a long period of success doesn’t happen overnight, especially when a number of the departures hadn’t been planned for or anticipated.
Good luck though.

so what is the answer?
Either we have a quality competition where teams successes ebbs and flows or do you want to return to the “good old days” where only the rich clubs survive?
Isn’t that kind of thinking one the reasons there was the super league war?
If there is to be an even competition where each and every club has the opportunity for success, then there has to be a certain degree of openness and parity to achieve that – a salary cap is a good start to that ambition but with all the tinkering around the edges, the explosion of exemptions and allowances (long serving player allowance, marquee allowance and so on) plus the rise and rise of the use TPA’s (remember they were introduced with the intent of providing the elite players with alternate income streams, not all and sundry), the salary cap is now fairly ineffective.
You mention that Cowboys, Canberra and Newcastle are one city teams – correct, however the populations and therefore business opportunities are limited in comparison to the likes of the Broncos and Storm – Brisbane population of 2.3m, Townsville180k, Newcastle 430, Canberra 424k. So yes they have a distinct leg up.
The Broncos definitely lead the way in administration of a club and are rightly held as a benchmark, but they do have a distinct competitive advantage over every other club in the land.
I don’t profess to have an answer for all the issues that come with the current arrangements, but one thing I do know is that isn’t working as it was originally intended to and, rightly or wrongly, some clubs are gaining unintended competitive advantage over others.
Also, Terry Hill has a lot to answer for.

Tigers will be in that logjam of teams competing for 7-14th and most likely will succumb to the pressure in the run home and finish about 11-12th.
While Tedesco, Woods and Moses are fit, they could challenge most teams on their day but if they are off most teams apart from possibly the Dragons and Knights would tear them apart.
Aparts from Woods and Taylor, their forward pack wouldn’t inspire too much confidence. Aloiai has some potential but apart from that it is stacked with what can best be described as journeymen.
Backline can be exciting one minute, frustrating the next. Cameo Naiqama can do some freakish things but is not consistent. Nofoaluma is sold but not great, Simona was ok but is now gone. Idris could be good but needs to get rid of his laziness.
Only the most fervent supporter would say they were good for anything above 8th spot.

That would never happen surely?
The leagues club would surely open their books to the NRL and confirm that nothing untoward happened? Surely.
The guy supposedly doing the deals wouldn’t quit his high paying and responsible position and disappear never to be seen again? Surely not?
Surely the NRL wouldn’t allow this kind behaviour to occur and not thoroughly investigate it? Surely they would?

I was interested listening to commentators talking with Finch at the T20 last night, Travis Head had just pegged a ball at the stumps when it wasn’t needed (in the context of the game and the moment) and Finchy said something along the lines of “he is just like maxi, full of energy but doesn’t know when to control it and follow instructions”.
To me that was a fair indicator of why Maxwell has the issues he does – he doesn’t listen to or follow instructions.
Head can be forgiven for his youthfulness, but Maxwell is now old enough to know when he should or shouldn’t listen.
No-one can doubt his talent, its his exuberance and over reliance on talent and not hard work that seems to be his downfall.
Cant believe that Wade is our first choice ‘keeper either – Hartley seems to be the only decent ‘keeper of the last decade who hasn’t been given a go with the uncertainty over Wades back and keeping, the loss of faith in Nevill, the loss of form of Paine, the retirement of Haddin – Hartley should have been on the plane.
I also struggle with the fascination of all selection panels with the Marsh boys – how many chances have they been given and not lived up to it.

I hope he doesn’t Johnny lol