Good morning to the King!
Eels Captain Clint Gutherson took the first significant steps towards a round one return when he hit the field for some opposed work at Kellyfield today.
Though wearing the fluoro orange vest indicating no contact, Gutho was back to making himself a significant presence, barking at his team mates from behind the line and sweeping into attacking plays.
Obviously Gutherson is still in his rehab program, as evidenced by the vest, but he’s continuing to push towards that round one goal.
This was the first field session of the week, with Monday’s torrential rain in north-western Sydney flooding the field and pushing the training indoors. Photos from the gym have been posted by Eels media.
As for today, it was a step up in the workload and intensity on last week. This was to be expected given that the countdown to the official trials is well and truly on.
After warm ups, the morning commenced with the team splitting into NRL and NSW Cup teams as they drilled unopposed attacking sets in the red zone. Gutho had completed his warm ups with the rehab group, so it was a pleasant surprise when he was called over for the ball play.
From structured to the unstructured, the next work was four on three attacking the line down a corridor. This stuff requires scrambling in defence, and eyes up footy in attack.
Before launching into full contact opposed, the squad came together for more running. Conditioning runs, including Malcolms, along with defence line movement, broke up the football component throughout the session and added fatigue to their work.
The contact opposed began with one team being asked to focus on attack, with the other side having more of a defensive load. This was achieved with the attacking team getting a full set of six. In contrast, after fielding a kick, the other team would only get a couple of tackles before they were asked to kick the ball down field.
Opposed
The role of attacking or defending team was swapped throughout the session.
By nature, this drill meant that even the team in possession were mostly in yardage. Despite limited opportunities, there were a couple of highlights provided by the NRL team.
Will Penisini
After receiving the ball around half way, Penisini got on the outside of his opposite, and started to cut between the centre and winger. Looking on the inside for support, he found Gutho looming up, who in turn linked with Moses who streaked away for the try.
Shaun Lane
Getting his arm free, Lane offloaded to Bailey Simonsson. The centre/winger broke into open pastures, before passing inside for Moses as the defence converged. The pass was a little low so Moses intelligently toed the ball ahead, regaining it in the in-goal for the try.
Later in the morning, both teams exchanged full sets in possession. If the coaches saw what they wanted to see, they’d blow the whistle and play would restart from a predetermined point on the field.
The defence today was very close to NRL match day standard. Collisions were most definitely felt, and there were some errors by the Cup team forced by the impact of the NRL defenders.
There were a number of rotations with players running into and out of the game as the coaches ensured game time and opportunities for all players to shine.
The competition for places continues.
Eels forever!
Sixties
Good to hear the king is building back to full fitness, I assume Junior and Woody are still in the rehab group?
Will be interested to see if there’s much work done on restart options as we get closer to trials given the rule changes announced today (not sure it’s a great change but teams will have to adjust and exploit it accordingly).
Very true. I’m not sure I like the change. In fact I don’t. It now makes long drop outs a poor option.. we discuss this in depth on the podcast which was recorded Wednesday night and will be out on Thursday.
Looking forward to listening to the podcast. My view is it’s a stupid rule change. I hate it. They’re making this change to increase excitement and unpredictability but the excitement of the short drop out comes with the risk. They may get penalised but it can also backfire by creating space for a try to happen, as seen in the final game against Penrith. It also forces play makers to practice this skill and perfect it. Now it doesn’t matter, the defensive team can do whatever radical kick they want and there’s no price to pay. I think many teams will back their defence and just kick the ball out so there’s just a set defensive line and a play the ball.
Me Sixties, I missed the rule change, can you please provide me with a brief update – thank you.
I also dislike the rule change there. The short drop out was a high risk- high gain option and to me, THAT was the thing that put punters on the edge of their seats. I believe that if you take that massive risk of a penalty away, it takes that edge away
100% NS. The idiots in charge have made it low risk high reward and coincidently just happens to favour the Roosters with their tall timber out wide.
I’d just like to have one year where we didn’t change some rules, even the ones I don’t like.
As my grandfather used to say if you keep fiddling with something, eventually you’ll break it so leave well alone.
I expect all coaches have already devised how they’ll exploit this change cluster.
Thanks 60s …. how is the Harper / Simonsson battle for centre working / likely to work? When they split into NRL and Cup sides, do they share their time between squads or is one marked NRL and one Cup?
I presume at some point pre round 1, BAs likely choice will become obvious in that respect. The player spending more time in the NRL squad presumably getting the chocolates.
The battle has barely started post Christmas as last week was fairly light and Monday was washed out. It will be clearer come February and fans will get to judge themselves when trials are named.
Haven’t heard about Cini, is he likely to come into discussion about a centre spot?
Please nooooooooooooo
It’s interesting to read about the different combinations in action. For example, how the combinations work in relation to when things go well or perhaps when the ball is not delivered the way it’s expected. The reaction in that case is was an improvisation that went well. Martin.
Martin, we start to see more of that when the opposed training becomes more free flowing. At the moment the coaches are dictating where play starts and ends. As we get closer to the trials they let it flow more – so you see more of what you’re hoping to see.
Great that Moses is finishing off some tries but that should not be his main role backing up. Seems we dont have a decent outside back that can keep up and be on the end of these plays. It’s the job of players like JAC, Koula and Saab types that we lack to finish off these tries
In the examples today both breaks were made down the sideline so the support was streaming through on the inside. Maybe I should have tried to create a better image of the breaks. You don’t think half backs should be a main support player? I reckon not only should they be sprinting through in support on the inside, but in Parra’s case Brown and Moses are two of the fastest players in the team, and indeed are probably the fastest halves pairings in the NRL. If they aren’t the ones breaking the line, I’d hope that they are offering a support option on the inside.
We scored 9 more tries than manly and 28 more than the dogs. We also scored 18 more tries than the roosters who played 2 more games than us and despite them having “quicker” players.
Speed is extremely overrated in the greater NRL. You only need to be quick enough, which most NRL players are. Look at when Junior Paulo “ran down” JAC a few seasons ago, in a race JAC would burn Paulo every time but in that instance Paulo was quick enough to prevent the line break. And how many times have we seen a prop or second-rower be the ones chasing outside backs down the sideline?
Saab and Koula are much faster than Brian To’o. I know which winger I’d rather have in my team
Excellent perspective Ham
Im glad Mitch is backing up but he and Dylan are our stars. We need them to direct the team, create the chances and have speedsters finish them off. If Mitch is the man to start each play and we rely on him to back up every break and finish each play, he wont last the season.
He is our Quaterback, create the opportunity an dmake sure speedster finishes it all off.
George, this is coming from a couple of training plays. If they set up a break and back it up too so be it. In no way am I suggesting that other outside backs shouldn’t be there in support, the goal should be for all players to look to back up the break if possible, and give multiple support options. The same goes for chasing opposition breaks. The message would be simple – stay in the game, stay alive, because you never know what might happen.
Crikey ,Every half thats ever played is coached and relied on to back up breaks , check out dally m awards !!
Good to see Gutho is back.
I really hope to see some articles about them working hard on some new defensive structures our defence out wide was almost non existent with teams passing along their backline like it was a trading run and us being constantly caught a man or two short.
Please let here be some sort of change this year to how we defend maybe at least try to slow down the ruck or learn how to number up when defending scrums. Defence wins premierships.
You can literally guarantee that every attacking drill has the team practising the defence. So when I describe one team being given most of the possession, that’s so the other team has the defensive focus and load placed on them. It’s then rotated so that all players have that. There are drills that are solely defence skills. They also do contact sessions during the week that aren’t part of these field sessions. The other thing about my reports is that I have a line that I don’t cross in terms of what I describe. For example, if they work on any changes to shapes, or systems, particular set pieces, I’m hardly likely to go into detail about exactly what they are doing. I’m sure you understand that aspect.
Really appreciate your posts. Attended Titans training Tuesday and met one of their junior coaches who said Matt Keating is up here in some capacity.
Cheers Glenn. I think I had read something along those lines recently about Keating. By the way, don’t go changing allegiances on us!
Been following Parra for around 60 years, doubt I’ll change at this point in my life. However they may become my second team. Have met some of their players who all seem genuine with their greetings.
Thanks for the update Sixties.
Glad Gutho is nearing return. Not sure what we would do without him in round one otherwise…
Are Junior and Wiremu looking fit after the break?
Cheers
Yeah, I added a final comment about those two in my last report, along with the media photo of them both at work. Woody looks as fit as he’s ever been, and Junior looks almost chiselled. Rehab involves a fair bit of running. However, the test will come when they’re asked to do the conditioning work alongside the team.