: Sun Feb 15, 2009 8:07 pm
In my opinion something has to chamge on the left with either King or Penny being dropped because to me the left side of our team is virtually a non existent attacking threat and its also a defensive liability, the problem we have is a lack of strength in depth in the backs as ive always said that Paul Johnson is a right sided 2nd rower and Chris Bridge to me is an out and out stand off so we have little other options in the centres.
Paul Johnson has good pace for a 2nd rower but not for a back, Jimmy Lowes has to be careful here as to what precedent he sets for our players performance wise because to me Matt King`s performances have simply not been good enough since he arrived.
The coach has to make a stance at some point and say to a player that your performances are not good enough to be selected for the 1st team, Matt King has never been dropped or subbed yet due to his poor performances and its about time that he was judged on what he does on the pitch rather than his so called reputation from the NRL. The bloke is an expensive cart horse,
Judging by how poor Catalan were against Huddersfield its possible that both King and Penny could look good against them but to me that would just be papering over the cracks, in the big games our left side simply won`t be good enough especially in defence.
Like i said before Matt King arrived he was playing in a very good Melbourne side where most of the time he would be left with a run in or a close range barge over because of good work from the likes of Cooper Cronk and Greg Inglis, his height was also an asset to the Storm for high kicks. He`s certainly never looked the type of player that will be a creator that can open up defences with nimble footwork and out and out pace. His lack of centre skills was one of the main reasons that he played on the wing for NSW and the Australian test side, again his size and height suited the way that both NSW and the Aussies played the game as he gave them options in the air and also with his size at close range to finish off great team work.
The concerns i have for this season are that Michael Monaghan has no pressure on him to perform, to me he will always be at 7 if fit. The same can be said of Matt King, as long as he is fit i can see him playing as we have little other options at left centre.
The only way i can see that we can replace Monaghan from 7 is to play Micky Higham at scrum half and put Monaghan at 9 to see if he can reproduce his Manly form, with the lack of strength in depth at scrum half i see no other option if you wanted to change things other than put Bridge at 6 and Briers at 7 but thats been tried and it didn`t get us that far.
I don`t have the answers other than to try and find some cheap Quantas deals to return them both back to Aus, economy class of course or excess baggage.
