And slso Mdog when you didn't retreat behind the ref after a tackle it was off side.

Bit of a mixed effort from Tommo, had to step up to more minutes...

Smith and  DWZ our main defensive weakness...

A bad way to end the season.... bring on 21.... it can't be worse.

Both are totally & utterly useless.... our forward pack can’t dominate a tackle if their lives depended on it!

And unfortunately, Wakeham has so much work to do & hopefully T Baz can salvage something out of him as he looks lost

I still think Wakeham has what it takes, so do Fittler, Gould and co.

He does need to work on his kicking game. And he needs to get more involved.
Just a bit young and inexperienced I think.

Averillo does stand out, for someone with limited experience he has an impact on the result. 
The best players typically make an impact from day 1.

Wakeham is a victim of our really poor go-forward.

You can say that about every half but some (definitely the good ones coz they have to play in tough games at SOO level) as well as some lesser known players can do it. 

In a team rolling forward, Wakeham has shown he can take advantage of opportunities. 

I just hope Barrett can change the way we play coz someone like Wakeham is wasted in a team that plays 80s footy.

It's like Luai. He'd look shit playing our style.

Matt Frawley playing 5/8th for Raiders.

And my favourite.....Tom Starling.

WE MUST SIGN STARLING.

NOW FEKKING. 

DOUBLE THAT COMMENT

Alas...that is 80 minutes plus I have lost forever...one aim in going was to farewell Tolman but alas twas not to be...the curse of the Mock hanging over me. I have come to the conclusion that there is no point in going to games. It is much better on Foxtel....no chance of seeing if Thompson really did something untoward..is he is trouble? He was easily our best...not that it meant much. Penrith were given the grace of our win last week and a Bronco's loss...they haven't had the loss "they need to have' so I don't believe they will do too much more damage. 
Perhaps I am basing it on their fans. I used to go to Cumberland Oval....the pre directional-changed Leichhardt Oval was bad. Newcastle fans are morons BUT for sheer ugly loudmouth scum I reckon the Penrith fans behind us today were as bad as ANY i have ever seen.Total garbage...Maybe I am basing it on that but Penrith ut in two staright weeks. The "loss we had to have" has come too late.

Maybe that is why the Rorters were happy to lose last night.
Parra win and the get to play Penrith in Sydney rather than the Storm at Sunshine Coast (if that is where they will play)
Todays game - maybe DWZ should be added to the 8.
I agree the only teams the Panthers can beat out of the top 6 are Knights and Sharks.
What a flukey run (in the bottom teams they have played) they have had since the Covid hiatus.

Looking at the "incident" with Thompson I think whilst his hands were perhaps on the eyes of Tamou it was accidental...no raking mostion at all and when he broke the tackle he released cleanly. 

Steve, the eye contact will likely get LT suspended, can't see how it wont. I hope it wasn't premeditated & that it was just a moment of mindlessness or something like that without him knowing what he was doing. If it was premeditated, it wasn't LT's smartest moment (underestimating the 20 cameras zoomed in from all angles). At least there was no injury caused, but it didn't look too good. I thought LT had a good match though.

It should be on the minor end of the scale.
He looked like he pulled away once he realised his fingers were massaging Tamous macular....

I think referees should call advantage when they are playing it.  I never feel comfortable when they all of a sudden pull a penalty out of their backside. No difference to six again.  Much criticised union refs seem to be able to manage it.

There's an article gone up about it on nrl.com. Both LT & Tamou play it down to not being deliberate or a big deal. The thing is, you know what the officials can be like, they'll disregard anything anyone says & watch the video seeing fingers in the eye...and you said yourself "his fingers were massaging Tamou's macular".

JO looking at a 7-9 months stint on the sidelines..... T Baz surely needs to bring in some strike on the flanks. 

Does Ashley Klein injury mean more time in the bunker?  Hope not after Friday.

It looked like they got it wrong today when Thompson was not awarded a try...my eyes are not what they used to be but could not see where Thompson had lost contact with the ball....though the drunken Penrith yobbos behind had no doubt.

DWZ isn't suitable for other positions, perhaps centre, definately not fullback.

Baz might be able to turn his game around, in the past he has been a much better player.

I recon sign young Tristan  Sailor, wing, fullback, 5/8 different to JO has some pace, skill and footy instincts.

Thompson has gone very close to scoring a couple of times, in  both cases the bunker had to split hairs to deny him.

Perhaps he scores lots of tries in 21, if our team is playing better footy there will be more opportunity.

He impressed...has good burst of speed when he gets the ball and is pretty quick.

Purely accidental. But he will get suspended because it’s his duty of care to make sure his hands aren’t there. A couple of weeks would be a fair cop. Any more than that and they’d be unfairly putting it in the deliberate range.

Bulldogs player loading to be added....I guess "you pricks have robbed me of two legitimate tries" won't count

I hope he gets over his homesickness because he’s starting to show why he’s so highly rated. I don’t think there’s a forward in the game with his acceleration over 10-20m or can step at the line as good as him. And when he does run straight at them he does it hard and aggressively.

Tom should have a lot of plays designed around him as the runner.

Very important cog.

Yes I agree. 
We need to get more of our forwards running alongside him to create doubt in the defence. 
I'm thinking guys like RFM, Ogden, Smith and Renouf. 
Unfortunately guys like Jacko, Elliott, Stimson just don't have the energy. They can be effective off the back of quick play the balls but otherwise just lumber up in attack.

For too long our club has been fascinated with having multiple forwards playing 80mins or close to that with hardly any go-forward due to fatigue or lack of high energy fitness.

We need to move to a more high energy, short stint rotation, with our halves understanding fatigue and how to adjust game tempo to suit the team.

If you look at the top successful teams and their halves, you can see a pattern. They have players in the halves/spine that understand this.

A perfect example is Souths. Cody Walker may have looked brilliant the other night with all things going well. But if the chips were down, only AR could have saved their arses. He is the game manager that can vary the tempo of games with kicks or playing the ball out.

That's what we need, along with some forwards who can follow the speed and running style of Thompson. Barrett can then sort out the timing of his interchanges. 

You only have to look at the week before where Reimis carried Walker 10 metres to score. He is no doubt a brilliant front runner...possibly the best in the game but ....

Dont get me wrong. He is a brilliant instinctive footballer and can take or create an opportunity when he wants to. Same as Luai for Penrith. 

But coming back to the comment about hard running forwards who charge onto the ball, hit gaps and get quick play the balls (like Thompson), very few can do that for 80mins. Some can only do it for around 40mins. And that is why it is important to have a game manager at half or hooker who can control tempo. To give the shorter stint guys a chance to extend their on field minutes to say 60mins. That helps with the bench rotation especially with HIA unavailabilities etc.

We unfortunately don't have enough of these forwards and we certainly  dont have the half that can control tempo. Lewis with his long kicking game, is probably the only one that can kick downtown and offer some relief on fatigue. 

In retrospect the decision to get rid of Pay was correct...you have to play every sport with what you have and he seriously undermined this...it is the coaches responsibility to instill confidence and that is/was his biggest failing.

Stop agreeing with me.

Go get the real Steve back.

In all honesty, i just caught a FOX interview of Fwit Des prior to their game vs Warriors today and in amongst all the nose farts, it reinforced our decision to get rid of him.
IMO 3 seasons too late but correct decision nonetheless.

The moon did have a strangely bluish hue about it last night if you hadn't noticed.