Sydney Roosters vs Melbourne Storm: NRL live scores, blog

TB ... was thinking the same and checking if you know of updates of Storm players out at the moment - I'm not thinking they're down as much as the chooks but 3 ...4 of their regulars? I thought they had some troops down which made their performance all the more brutal last Thursday evening. Regards your comments on the chooks I keep thinking back to the game they played against Parra a few weeks back in which they defended their feathers into feather dusters ... still lost but gees they had some ticker in them and with a number of troops down.

That's what I was trying to get my head around as well TB and Brendon ... in that I've seen plenty go to the bin for less this session ... and so 'yep, he was putting pressure on Walker' and 'yep, it seemed careless' ... but I've been watching plenty of players pull out and if they do wrap their arms around the kicker they don't fling them beyond that point. Anyways, as you say perhaps things have diluted of late. And the above is not about the score or effecting in the score because in the end the score reflected how well Melbourne played and how poor the chooks played (beyond the first 10 to 15 mins at least). On another note it was great to see some close games tonight :)

Oh no mate, I was taking the **ss at the people that will still hate them. 100% agree with you, they are absolutely amazing even after the rule change that should have seen them crumble. Apologies, I stuffed up on that :)

You may have misinterpreted me; I was expressing admiration that they've managed to adapt to the new game and turned themselves into an exciting attacking team to watch.

Penalties received tend to reflect on ladder position. 6 agains not so much other than blowouts. I think the 6 again has been a mistake, causing injuries and scores unacceptable contests.

I think he was just impressed he could vaguely remember something from the 80s. Next we'll have some things warning us about AIDs, 18% mortgages, programming the VHS and 50c phone calls from a fixed line phone in your hall way.

Looking at the stats the Roosters are fairly accustomed to giving up penalties to win football games. One of the most penalised teams in the comp and I think they’re happy to use spoiling tactics to stop a try especially inside their 20m. The lesser teams aren’t as good at executing and generally panic.

Speaking as a Cowboys fan, the Storm are the benchmark. Post Cronk, post Slater, post Smith, what's left? Bellamy. Roosters are not a bad team, and didn't play poorly. It's just the Storm were so good. Qld could do with the imagination and discipline of the Storm play.

HY, remember that washing party pies down with riesling while jumping at the same time is a potential choking hazard

I think I was referring to two strong evenly matched teams getting into “the grind” or “the wrestle” prior to the new rules that we are missing. We just aren’t seeing those tight contests anymore. These close attritional games were incredibly tense and exciting to watch with a moment of brilliance often deciding games as they went down to the wire. The better teams are just so far ahead this season its not funny and I think the introduction of the 6 agains – many of which appear to be awarded for minor indiscretions – and the lack of penalties being awarded that is contributing to it. The refs are having far too much influence on the flow of the game. Its so much harder now for teams to defend – though the Storm and the Panthers have succeeded with their up tempo game style taking the juice out of the opposition. When we had more penalties teams could use set plays in attack and defences could reset to counter them. It was far more of a contest. But I guess we are stuck with it for now and the bottom teams have to improve to become competitive and coaching styles need to change. Ricky Stuart’s coaching style seemed to suit the close grind rather than this uptempo high scoring style of game we now have. Coaches like Bellamy and Cleary have adjusted far more quickly.

I wouldn't have expected them to win, in all fairness, but the differential was almost the same as the Tigers the week before. The Roosters have way to much talent still on the park to be at that level. Perfect example, JWH makes an intercept and a break. He was never going to get away, we all knew it. Why were the only players chasing Storm players though? Where was the support? The team just seems to have crumbled, and it should be his job to stop the rot, he just doesn't seem able to.

I get they’ve been out for a while, but it’s not like he can draft replacement players into the squad of anywhere near the same caliber. So yeah, he’s had a long time to get used to it but he’s still got a maybe $3M hole in his roster that can’t be replaced Great win by the Storm…

“There is no drama, no theatre, no tension at the moment and it makes it hard to watch” - 100% correct

It’s pretty easy calling the Roosters pathetic, but they’ve got Cordner, Friend, Keary, BMoz, Collins out for the season. That’s five Origin level or better players Plus Radley, Smith, Butcher out, plus Tedesco, Crichton, Hutchison, Verrills, Tupounuia, Lam, and TKO who’ve missed chunks of foot The Roosters have three players who’ve played every game The Panthers came back to the pack when they were missing their Origin players It’s not putting the Storm down to talk about the impact of the rules. They deserve to be leading the comp. but these constant 40+ to not many scores are rubbish for the game. It’s not just six agains…

But you’re talking about how the game was 35 years ago… we weren’t getting 4-2 score-lines two years ago or even 5, 10, 25 years ago It’s a furphy to say the alternative to 46-0 is to go back to 4-2 No doubt the rest of the comp need to up their game. The Storm and Panthers are deservedly the best teams in the comp and would be under any rules, but these constant blowouts are terrible and they’re being facilitated by the rules 2021 Panthers and Storm are both in the top 5 for teams for and against after 15 rounds. That says something. These are good teams but are they both two of the best teams of all time…? As an aside, I rewatched the 86 grand final recently. That was the 4-2 game and it wasn’t just a one out forward slog-a-thon. There was actually a surprising amount of ball movement, but yeah, no tries does make it a tough watch

One of the Roar authors wrote a piece "are you not entertained" the other week where people argued even though results were skewed, the talent on show was still exciting. Well it isn't and I do wonder if these next couple of weeks where many games will be at neutral venues or without crowds to create any atmosphere or even background noise will highlight the problems. I generally enjoy watching Melbourne play, and was really looking forward to a proper contest last night. But between commentators (Ch 9) calling it remotely and sounding like they would rather be in bed for the opening minute, no crowd, pumped in fake crowd noise, and the contest lacking any sort of competitiveness, it was a wildly disappointing game. When I switched over to see what the score was in the AFL between Richmond and the Gold Coast Suns ( a team where i couldn't name a single player), i saw it was a contest and stayed with it instead.

They've been playing that sort of method a lot, especially with the Grant Cheese combo. Grant comes on and ups the intensity suddenly, it could be the way they are managing the new rules. I get he is missing a lot of his team, but in reality, he needs to adjust and hasn't been able to at all. If the players were only just out, 100% he needs some time to fix issues, but Cordner hasn't played all season, Friend and Keary were down in March, even BMOZ and Collins were down early May. The Radley situation sort of reinforces it, he needs to get that stuff out of his teams game, and yet 4 out of the top 20 penalty givers play for the Roosters. I'm not saying he is the worst coach in the world, but the fanfare that was around him the last 4 or 5 years has to be looked at surely.

How would you know who to cheer for n a Kaufusi v JWH fight… :laughing: :laughing: Welch’s tackle was fine under the current interpretation of the rule but I think it’s a poor interpretation. He’d have known a long way out he wasn’t going to beat the kick but the rules allow him to still tackle Walker after the ball has gone Yet again, there was a rule in place to prevent this sort of thing but it’s been diluted. We’ve gone from “you can’t tackle a player after he’s kicked it” to “well, it’s ok to tackle him after he’s kicked it as long as you wrap the arms…” It’s not a knock on Welch because that’s the way the rules are set up and everyone does it, but it’s not right…

Couldn’t agree more… that game was dead in the water after 20 minutes… most are

A tight, tough game doesn’t necessarily mean a wrestle any more than these new rules mean the wrestle is gone. Not having a go at you Geoff because it’s how we speak about footy now, but I think some of these terms have become incorrectly interchangeable Close game, tough forward play = wrestle. New rules = wrestle gone = exciting footy. Neither is true Something has to be done. I’d love to do a survey of people who watched that game and have them rate it. It was dull as dishwater. That should have been a blockbuster