Manly Sea Eagles or champs2chumps2009@yahoo.com
Still looking for a new nicknameSeason Highlight: Winning the Club Challenge to round out a stellar 12 months.
Season Lowlight: A Boozy Season Launch (the latest in a string of superb Phrases Brought To You By League) from which they never fully recovered.
Most Valuable Player: DNA Freak Anthony Watmough. He hit a purple patch of form that lasted until the first minute of the Melbourne game. The most feared, revered and genetically mutated forward in the game.
Most Worthless Player: David Williams. The enigmatic winger with a line through his name reached great highs but even greater lows. Was at least able to provide cops with a complete set of Greg Inglis fingerprints.
Telling Statistic: Their top tryscorers were Ben Farrar and David Williams with 11 each. That is weak.
Quote that best sums up their year: Five minutes into the Melbourne-Manly game, League Blog snuck into the coach’s box for a quick chat with Des Hasler. Here’s the transcript and as usual, these are real quotes.
League Blog: Bad luck about the Slater try, at least Smith missed the conversion.
Des Hasler: That is now of no consequence, the game and the points are gone.
LB: Wow, but there’s still 75 minutes to go. Don’t tell me you’re already planning Mad Monday?
DH: I'm pretty sure we're in just as good a place as we were last year.
LB: Well, that’s something. Can you explain the teams’ approach to Mad Monday? I’ve heard you like to wheel out a giant cryogenically preserved woolly mammoth testicle.
DH: You've just got to hold the ball and do the little things that no one likes to do.
LB: I see, that sounds grim. Is it true you and the team’s leadership group have asked David Williams not to participate because he might drop the mammoth testicle?
DH: There are 100 people who will sign sworn statements to back me up.
LB: Ok, ok, I believe you. Finally, can you explain why whenever one of your players has a cold, they start sniffing Jamie Lyon?
DH: Because blokes like Jamie, they never lose the smell of gum leaves.
LB: Fair enough. Ok Des, thanks for your time.
2010 Outlook: All the ingredients are there for the team to return hungry and ready to ensure they finish near the top of the table next year. League Blog also predicts a revamped season launch.
Critique of Part X . . .
ReplyDelete"champs2chumps" - they aren't chumpses, they fought back strongly (on the field) to finish 5th ... and may well have prospered longer if they had finished 6th!
The 'Club Challenge' - of course is in really called the World Club Challenge, and to win it on foreign shores has been proven over a number of years to be quite a difficult assignment.
I agree that is a season highlight, along with beating the Dogs in a quality game, beating Storm in Melbourne and hammering the Titans in Round 26.
I also agree with all the other categories, except the 'Telling Statistic' - the team as a whole scored heaps of tries, I think it was Manly's defence & discipline that was notably down from last year.
All up - a slightly disappointing season from the viewpoint of Manly fans to follow up their brilliant performance last year, but nevertheless pleasing to see the players trying so hard. I also agree that they look in fair shape for 2010, so the other teams still alive with designs on this year's title would be well advised to take their chance while they can...Go Manly! (doh)
While your sadness is apparent, there is no sadness quite like that of supporters of a team who won the comp last year. By my clock you've got another three years before you can complain. Htime
ReplyDeleteMaybe round about now would be good. XD
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