First Noddy Giveth Then Noddy Taketh Away

A few thoughts from a surprisingly unshattered Dogs fan/precise and eloquent league blogger.

The Dogs couldn’t have played much better. As a fan, coach, player etc you can’t ask much more than that. I hate to say it, but League Blog predicted this. Based on form and ability, the Dogs ended up right where they should have.

Kimmorley wasn’t at his best, especially in terms of clearing kicks and fifth tackle options; Roberts and Ennis were strong but never looked like game breakers. Obviously we were a lot stronger with Noddy, but you couldn’t shake the feeling that part of the deal with Kimmorley is that he’ll take you far, but only so far. That’s the tradeoff.

The Dogs’ only play, spreading it left for a pass or kick to Goodwin or Morris, got them two tries and almost a third. I wonder what might have happened had Kimmorley not gone for field goal in the dying stages of the first half.

The Dogs found it easy to make ground with the ball, but were a bit like Titans 2.0, making dents but never running them ragged, creating the opportunity to create an opportunity, but wasting it with poor kicks.

For mine, the match turned on the Dogs inability to contain Parra’s offloads (that and the inability to contain accidental knees and chicken wings). The Eels’ hitups weren’t overly starchy, but they had so many offloads it didn’t matter. It was like the 2002 Warriors all over again. They had more offloads than passes. Even the Dogs started copying them at one point. The analogy with the 2002 Warriors should worry all Eels fans.

The Eels can definitely win the GF – no matter how many holes you pick in their game, the other team will have them too – but I would have to tip Storm/Broncos at this stage. This is based on League Blog’s patented Ceiling/Floor Argument. It goes like this.

Dogs have an arbitrary ceiling of say 80%. They have a floor of 70%. Eels have a ceiling of 90% and a floor of 60%. From this we can say that the Eels at their best are too good for the Dogs at their best.

As it turns out, neither of them played their best, but this was at least partly due to the quality of the opposition; that won’t change next week. That is, the Eels will fancy themselves improving next week, but I can’t see the Storm’s/Bronco’s defence giving them any more, nor their attack threatening the Eels any less.

In summary, the CFA tells us the Dogs have been extremely consistent all year, but when another team brings their A game, the Dogs falter. As some people might say, they can’t find another gear to go to. People accused the Titans of this, and were right, and the Dragons of it, and were wrong. Dragons just played their worst footy at the wrong time of year.

The implications of this for the Dogs next year are clear. Unless something changes, they won’t go any further. We might leave it to another post to say what those changes could be.

Meanwhile the Eels have rewritten the book on contending for a title, and they’ve given heart to all teams sputtering along with five wins and tens losses. If you can assemble a team that has incredible potential, don’t worry too much about getting the best out of them early on. Just throw everything together to simmer for a while, then turn the heat up when the time is right. Whether or not they win next week, it’s been an impressive cooking lesson.