STATS THAT MATTA

Round 12

EELS 26

(Tries: C. Gutherson, B. Ferguson, M. Sivo, J. Hoffman. Goals: M. Moses 5 from 6. Field Goals: M. Moses 0 from 2)

Defeated

RABBITOHS 14

(Tries: T. Burgess, T. Tatola. Goals: A. Reynolds 3 from 3.)

Friday, May 31 2019

Bankwest Stadium

Crowd: 21,645

It’s a much better feeling to be back in the winner’s circle, especially against the ladder leading Bunnies. Yes, yes, the Bunnies were depleted, but every team can only play whoever is in front of them, and to be fair, that Souths team threw more at the Eels than the Panthers and Cowboys did in the previous weeks.

It was encouraging to watch Moses run the ball more. He looks so much more dangerous when running the ball and the Rabbitohs left edge was always on alert when he carried the footy.

A massive shout out was earned by Manu Ma’u, with the rampaging backrower breaking the 200 running metres mark. Since his return he has been in top notch form.  It was a near faultless performance from ‘Munz’ , though I could be picky about Manu dropping off the Moses break before halftime instead of supporting on the inside. Moses made the break and looked inside where Ma’u should have been. He had fresh air in front of him and made that try a bit harder than it should have been. A try would have topped off a superb performance from Manu. Again, those one percenters that gets bandied about. Food for thought.

Another positive for the Eels was the centre paring of M. Jennings and Hoffman. The return of Michael Jennings just gives us more in attack and we can utilize both edges instead of just relying on Ferguson to do some of the hard work coming out of our back field.

But in saying that, we cannot get to carried away as we need to keep our heads down and do the gritty work. A team has to earn the glittery attacking stuff.

So let’s look at the Stats that Matta.

Score Flow

Game Stats

	Team Stats Full Time
52	Possession (%)	48
28/38 (74)	Complete/Total Sets (%)	32/40 (80)
45:45	Time – Opposition Half	35:21
17:30	Time – Opposition 20	12:17
2258	Metres Gained	2020
5	Scrum Win	7
1	Goal Line Dropout	1
8	Penalty Conceded	5
0	Forty Twenty	0

	Team Stats First Half
50	Possession (%)	50
14/18 (78)	Complete/Total Sets (%)	18/23 (78)
30:02	Time – Opposition Half	10:41
10:49	Time – Opposition 20	5:27
1179	Metres Gained	1087
3	Scrum Win	3
1	Goal Line Dropout	0
6	Penalty Conceded	3
0	Forty Twenty	0

	Team Stats Second Half
55	Possession (%)	45
14/20 (70)	Complete/Total Sets (%)	14/17 (82)
15:43	Time – Opposition Half	24:40
6:41	Time – Opposition 20	6:50
1079	Metres Gained	933
2	Scrum Win	4
0	Goal Line Dropout	1
2	Penalty Conceded	2
0	Forty Twenty	0

The Eels dominated field time in the first stanza and reaped the benefits of that.

That said, the penalty count did not reflect the dominance in both territory and metres gained by the Eels. It’s fair to say that the calls made – the 50/50 stuff as well as the penalties, kept the bunnies in the hunt.

When Bunnies turned it around in the second half, there was a sense of a fight back. But the Eels did hold strong and collected a good morale boosting win.

Player Stats

R12 Eels (Click to view)

Forward Rotation

There are some interesting observations to be made here.

In starting this match, Evans enjoyed an increase on his season average. He certainly didn’t let the team down.

A HIA accounted for fewer minutes for Junior, but it could be argued that the resulting performance could point towards fewer minutes. Marata dropped from a 70 minute average to a 30 minute impact bench player. Again, he delivered the type of performance to justify the change.

Finally Manu Ma’u reminded everyone that he can deliver 80 minutes of power, skill and ferocity as an edge forward.

Totals

Runs	187	159
Run Metres	1762	1363
Tackles	336	370
Missed Tackles	40	39
Tackle Ineffective	8	24
Effective Tackle Rate	87.5%	85%
Errors	14	10

Heat Maps

Set Starts

We can see the results of Reynolds kicking game, but there was still some decent field position in getting our sets started. Of course we would have preferred more in the opposition red zone. We used that bit of extra field to run the ball more and have our forwards push up the middle and utilize our edges.

Hit Ups

This heat map shows it perfectly. Our middles were running hard and creating metres for our halves to use the edges. Great to finally see some hard yards pushing deep in the opposition territory.

Summary

As stated earlier, it was a god win and good to get one over the ladder leaders. It just seems when we play the better teams (bar Storm) we lift and can compete at their level. But it is totally different against sides who are playing poor and we go down to their levels.

We need to perform at a consistent level to make a mark in this competition. The ups and downs that this team plays with is most obviously a mental issue, and it’s not good enough. Everyone knows they can play well and compete with the best. But its not about just competing, it’s about winning.

We competed on the scoreboard against the Cowboys and the Panthers, but we failed to deliver a winning mindset in those clashes. Those two performances against ordinary opponents were more disappointing than the Storm shellacking. That’s not disrespecting the Cowboys or the Panthers. But the reality is that they both provided more than enough opportunities for the Eels to win those matches. The Eels simply handed those opportunities back to them, and threw in a couple of extra chances themselves.

This week we travel to Shark Park. The team is looking stronger and with Nathan Brown on the extended bench, the Eels are looking close to being at full strength.

We can give the Sharks a good battle as long as we keep that winning mentality going. Have a listen to Matty Johns podcast from last week, or watch it on Fox, where he explains about the differences between competing and winning.

Yours in Blue and Gold

Colmac

Stats courtesy of Champion Data.

All these stats and more can be viewed on our match centre at http://mc.championdata.com/nrl/ including live game stats.

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