After a demanding road trip over the first two rounds of the season, the Parramatta Eels are finally returning home as they host the Dragons on Sunday afternoon. The Tip Sheet explores all the Team List Tuesday news and the changes that Jason Ryles has made this week as he tinkers with his forward pack. Sixties and Forty20 recap the round the was for the Blue & Gold and go over some bad news concerning Will Penisini.
Peter V’landys isn’t backing down on the rise of set starts as players and coaches start to vocalise their issues with the shift in the game. Is this brand of footy sustainable and what, if anything, gives? Bronson Xerri is unhappy at Belmore – what has led to this seemingly sudden conflict? Where could he end up? Alex Johnston etched his name in immortality as he conquered Ken Irvine’s long standing try scoring record. After all the hullabaloo, the fans peacefully stormed onto the field at Allianz Stadium and created an iconic moment for the game. What do the boys think about it all now that it is cemented in history?
Catch the live stream from 7:30PM!
My one critique of Ryles through 25 now the start of 26 we continue to start halves poorly.
You can’t win the game in the first 20 minutes of halves but you can certainly lose it.
The players have to be challenged individually to be ready to go when the whistle blows.
Momentum is so important we can’t continue to gift it when we run out of the sheds.
6 agains be damned we need to apply that infamous blow torch early and relentlessly.
Bup, I agree that far too often in 25 we conceded the first try, but in the majority of games in almost the entire back half of the season we were either leading, equal, or very close on the half time scoreboard. In some games, especially Panthers and Raiders, we collapsed in the second half. Interestingly in the first two rounds in 26 we scored first against the Storm and got massacred, then came back from a significant early deficit against the Broncos and led by half time. Still, I agree that starting better will make the task of winning more achievable.
I reckon Ryles has purposely left De Belin off the list for his own good.
De Belin will be hyped to the max and the Saints players will be baiting him.
Best just to take the air out of the situation and give him a rest.
He will be back next week and will play against the Saints later on in the year.
Well done Ryles.
Fair take Spark
I hope we are doing everything we can to get Xerri over to the Eels.
I understand that he doesn’t fit the culture but we are so so poor in outside backs we may just have to pay overs.
I can’t see anything in the reserves that even resembles a NRL player. Twiddle is a fullback / Utility and is really the only one that has any chance of graduating.
Now that Penisini is injured, we are only one injury away from disaster.
I’m a big Addo Carr fan but as he ages where are the young fast wingers in reserve grade.
Every other team seems to produce a surplus of good outside backs yet we can’t find one.
We asked Russell/Samrani to play against the Australian centres and although we held them, we cannot expect our centres to play at that level every week.
It’s a massive problem for us and the recruitment of Xerri, if he is released would transform our backline.
Spark, I’m confident that the Eels will be interested in Xerri should he become available. Of course that’s provided there aren’t concerns around what has transpired at the Dogs. They’d do any due diligence, but they’ve made it very clear about their self identified areas of need.
Agreed- it is shocking just how poor our backline is. And Our backline depth is even worse. It shouldn’t be that hard to find young outside backs but we don’t have good talent identification in that regard.
I think it’s a bit harsh to call our backline poor. Depth is a concern and we’d like a strike centre, but to call it poor is unfair.
I think our centres and wingers are
better than dragons, cowboys and titans. Maybe warriors as well. But it’s a bottom 4 group of centres and wingers in my opinion and we need to upgrade on penisini, new centre for Russell and get a good joint winger to put pressure on Bailey. Need more athleticism and youth in backline – Connor votano, Jonathan sua, Jethro rinikama, ontoni large at centre, Campbell graham (as souths salary cap must be so tight post haas signing), or a young raider as they are full of young backs.
Young not joint*
I would say if Nanva was called upon he might turn a few heads.I really rate him and think he can go to another level once he realises how good he can be.
I reckon he’d do well too Gianni
While writing about recruitment I’ll make a comment about Thursday’s very tough game between the Raiders and Bulldogs – at this stage Ethan is a far better player than Lachie Galvin
We lost Ethan when he had Dylan Brown and Mitch Moses ahead of him, apparently on long term contracts. Now that we have a vacancy at 6 from next year I believe that we should make every effort to get Ethan back; he is available to discuss 2028 in November if Ricky hadn’t extended him by then. I believe that he is on track to become elite.
Good shout,
Mitch’s last year is 29.
Currently we have Lorenzo and Joash looking like they will already be gun first grade No6s by then.
We also have Apa Twiddle and Lincoln Fletcher who should be First grade ready by then as well.
I’d love to see Ethan back at the club though. I was very disappointed how that all played out.