Following a lacklustre outing against last year’s premiers, our Eels boys find themselves travelling down the M31 towards the nation’s capital to tackle the boys in lime green, the Canberra Raiders.

Completing above 80% will be the number one item on Brad Arthur’s list of game KPI’s this evening, following two successive defeats where the blue and gold failed to complete over the 70% mark.

As we’ve seen over the course of our first two games, when we complete at or over 80%, we completely control the game. Our forwards get over the advantage line; we starve the opposition of possession and field position.; we look Melbourne like, suffocating our rivals out of the competition. Conversely, low completions have resulted in an ugly and stifled attacking structure, and a complete lack of field position in the 1 and 3/4 games that followed.

The equation today is very easy – simple, direct football with the forwards hitting it up with support runners, and passing choices either side of the halves will win us the game. This is the only way we can get regularly over the advantage line against a big Canberra pack – by pushing up in numbers, but controlling the ball as we do so, only offloading to a player that’s in a better position than the ball carrier to advance the play.

Possession is of the upmost importance against a big side that likes to use the football. If you starve them of possession and field position, you frustrate them into error. Just as we did to Manly in the season opener, and Cronulla did to us last week, we must do the same to the Raiders today.

Upon doing so, those passes we were trying to force last week, come a lot more naturally and hit their mark, instead of resulting in error. Those potential and half breaks, they turn into tryscoring opportunities and points – we just have to be prepared to earn it and exude the patience we did in the first two games.

Happy times: The Eels celebrate after a dominant 36-6 display against the Raiders in Round 6, 2016

If there’s something to take away from the first month of the NRL this year ladies and gentlemen, it’s this, the most patient team in any given contest, generally wins. You could attribute any given to a number of reasons, but it really is that straightforward – if you are patient, you will win!

This is because with the increase in ruck speed, fatigue is becoming a major contributing factor in 2017. Those teams that have had to sustain less than 50% of possession this year, have had bigger score lines put on them compared to recent years. Similarly, they are the teams who with the possession they do have, have struggled to get out of their own half – sounds a little familiar, doesn’t it?

At the moment this is purely anecdotal from the games I’ve watched, but I’d love to analyze the statistics of those sides losing by 13+ and the correlation between their completion rate, time in possession and time in their own half. It’s not something new to rugby league, or sport for that matter, however, I get the feeling the statistics have skewed more heavily this way already in 2017 and lent themselves to some of the bigger score lines we’ve already seen – and these are from teams who have looked like world beaters one week, and battlers the next.

Against the Sharks, we looked fatigued right from the start. There wasn’t as much energy about what we were doing. This followed on from a performance against the Titans where we tried to take shortcuts, looked flat and had no field position. We defended for large portions of that match, following the opening 20 minutes and we did a lot of it inside our own half. Some fortuitous tries resulted in a less than flattering score line in the Titans favour, but they only came about because the Titans were in position to take advantage of those opportunities, and they were in that position because we allowed them to be – for the record, we had 47% possession in this match, and that’s including our opening 20 minutes.

Teams who lack field position and had 45% or less possession are being beaten comfortably. Only the really good teams have managed to keep a 1-12 margin in their losses while maintaining this possession stat. This is because the energy that’s drained from the defensive efforts of these teams has leant itself to more mistakes being made as the ruck speed as further increased on 2016, and the errors being made are more crucial and telling to the result.

Canberra last week had a 68% completion and 45% of the football in a game away from home, and still only lost by one point (the sign of a good team). Against Cronulla they completed at 70% and had only 43% possession, and were done by the reigning premiers by 24 points. These are very telling stats for our side going into this evening’s match – starve Canberra of the ball and we will win.

The Raiders will have some ideas of themselves of how they’d like to take us down, so let’s have a quick look at who we will have to keep a close eye on this evening:

Nick Cotric & Jarrod Croker: Given the trouble our right hand-side defence has been experiencing thus far, it seems only natural to nominate these two. If you’ve watched any of the U/20s in recent years, you’d know that Nick Cotric is only getting a week closer to having his breakout performance with each game of NRL he plays. A big bodied man with lots of talent, he and point scoring machine Croker could have a field day if Takairangi & Hoffman don’t quickly get in sync. In fact one only needs to look back to the 4-try effort of Brenko Lee and the 6 tries the Raiders scored down their left attacking edge in our last encounter as a point of reference for how they’ll look to try and play this one. Holding our line in defence will be crucial.

Joey Leilua & Jordan Rapana: Almost anyone who follows rugby league these days knows how devastating these two can be. They come up against and equally devastating duo in Jennings and Radradra, who in the early parts of our most recent encounter and in the game before, were doing plenty of damage of their own. For all their prowess with the ball, Leilua and Rapana, can at times, be shown up defensively, as Cronulla exhibited on their most recent trip to GIO Stadium. Control possession and build pressure, and these two can be some prime targets in the Raiders defensive line. With both very much confidence players, the easiest way to keep them quiet, is to keep them busy and guessing without the football in hand.

Leilua headache: Michael Jennings has come up with three tries in two games for the Eels against the Raiders

Blake Austin & Aidan Sezar: Blake Austin is a very strong carrier of the ball. Aidan Sezar is a very astute kicker of the ball. Together that are a great halves combination that service their outside backs well and build great pressure. Aidan Sezar is a very composed player, who when rushed can be forced into error. Our markers on the last tackle should be committed to making themselves a nuisance to this man (Nathan Brown, anyone?). Blake Austin is a pure rugby league player. He’s aggressive, competitive and just loves to play. These type of players can be at times, easily frustrated, so getting into the head of a player like Austin can be enough to throw him off his game. Just don’t fall for his show and go!

Josh Papalii: The one time Eel to be is now a mainstay in representative teams and is such a menacing runner of the ball. The withdrawal of Tepai Moeroa means that Manu Ma’u shifts to the right edge to take on this hulk of a man. It’ll be a battle to watch, no doubt and Manu may just be the man to keep Papalii quiet. On the other hand, he may just be the man to trouble him defensively, with his strong leg speed while changing in direction, enough to catch Papalii flat footed and open up the opportunity for an offload or even a linebreak. Manu is coming for you Josh.

Limit the big men: Containing the likes of Josh Papalii will go a long way to an Eels victory tonight

Junior Paulo & Shannon Boyd: These two big men continuously get over the advantage line for their team. They’re big bodies who are hard to dominate. The only way to nullify them is to keep the ball out of their hands, and the only way to do that is to limit their possession and up their tackle count. Both are very susceptible to fatigue and if we can keep the ball away from them, we can stop the Raiders from generating any type of field position. The potential metres game from these two are why we must absolutely complete our sets today, for if we don’t, they will create the space for their outside backs to punish us relentlessly.

Josh Hodgson: From one Josh to another, Hodgson is the Raiders most valuable player. Everything they do stems from the creative control this man has over the green machine. He brings the big boys onto the ball, helps them get over the advantage line, is a very strong kicker of the ball and his running game can split a team wide open up through the middle. Fatiguing this man with defence and some selective gamesmanship (he’s carrying a rib injury Beau!) are the ways to stop this guy from stamping his authority on the match. The less minutes and time with the ball in hand for Josh Hodgson, the better it is for our defensive line. Don’t give him room to move and keep the players at marker and either side of them, actively communicating throughout the 80 minutes.

Game changer: Limit Josh Hodgson & you limit the Raiders

This is the toughest opposition that we have come up against so far this year Eels fans, so do not be disillusioned into thinking that it will take a big effort to beat the Raiders down in Canberra, a place we haven’t won at in 11 years. It will take our best effort to date to do so.

It’s why our completion rate, even more so than in previous games, will dictate today’s result.

Our prop forward rotation will have to be on top of its game. Strong carries, with the focus on possession, running in pairs and selective offloading.

The kicking games of Norman and Gutherson will also go a long way to determining this one. If both can repeat their first round efforts against Manly and we can generate the type of possession we were enjoying that game, along with the same type of completion rates, then we will get the job done.

Patience and cohesion is where we will sting the Raiders, so we have to earn the right to use the ball before attempting to actually do so. Failing this, the Raiders will have a field day, similar to the one they enjoyed in our last visit to GIO Stadium.

Hold the ball and tire them out – it’s really that easy.

Clint

All images courtesy of the Parramatta Eels, NRL.com and Getty Images

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