Five Metre Gap: Round 7 Wrap
Like the way of the Five Metre Gap in defence, looking at the points you may have missed from round seven of the NRL.
St George Illawarra share a competition best 5-2 record atop the NRL ladder with the Dragons defence winning plaudits in the opening seven rounds of the competition. The consistency of Paul McGregor’s side is epitomised by forward Leeson Ah Mau who has not conceded made an error all season. The damaging runner has made 173 tackles and recorded 56 hit-ups in an impressive start to the season. In case you are thinking ‘oh he is a forward, he has probably conceded a bunch of penalties.’ Nope, the Samoan international has only infringed once in seven games. The 25 year-old doesn’t score a lot of tries but perhaps it isn’t all bad for the Dragons pack with the departure of Trent Merrin next season.
Interestingly the Dragons, whilst they do have a strong defence are one of only two sides yet to crack 100 points for the 2015 season. The only other side to have scored less than 100 points this season is bottom side Manly (1-6) with 96 points to date. So again normal caveats apply for Dragons players as fantasy lynchpins for tries and as your goal-kickers (a special shout out to anyone with Gareth Widdop as their goal-kicker).
Penrith joined the list of inefficient sides in attack as they were humbled 32-6 by the Gold Coast on Saturday. After an hour of play they had been tackled inside the Titans ‘red zone’ 33 times for only one try whilst the Titans had a third of the amount of tackles (11) and scored twice to that point when they were in the Penrith final 20. The Panthers’ lack of spark was typified in a short period after the 60 minute mark when Tyrone Peachey tried to sneak a kick through and then not long after coughed up the ball close to the line. A creative team try for Neil Henry’s men followed by a couple of handy penalty goals were capped off by tries to Josh Hoffman and William Zillman in the final ten minutes of the encounter.
It’s worth acknowledging whilst people are out to harpoon Henry Perenara, Gavin Reynolds and the rest of the officiating crew from Sunday afternoon’s game at Leichhardt Oval that the Wests Tigers were their own worst enemy in missing 24 tackles and making seven errors as they were run down 30-22 by Canberra. Not including errors and poor last tackle play options that’s over an error every two and a half minutes by the Tigers. Whilst the missed table count wasn’t the most of anyone this round (34 were missed by the Roosters as they were edged in Melbourne) it is still a large amount. When 16 of those missed tackles came in the second half it is food for thought when compared with one, albeit simple, refereeing mistake.
Speaking of misses and errors, well done to both Cronulla and South Sydney who were surprisingly good with the ball in pitiful conditions on Monday evening as the home side were victorious in the Shire 18-10. The Sharks failed to complete only one set running with the wind in the first half going 19/20 and the Rabbitohs went 11/14 in the first 40 minutes. Both sides missed only 13 tackles combined in the first stanza. The game finished with 14 errors combined as Cronulla finished 37 of their 41 sets and Souths 28 of 34. Most times Souths’ completion rate of 82% will be enough for a win, but not on Monday evening.
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Hamish Neal
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