**Official** NRL 2009 Thread

[pinchy81]

Buy of the year will be De Gois imo really underrated player and I'm gutted we've let him go

Also on our halves situation Seymour and Barrett will play a couple of games together Ricky will then realise there not playing well together and we'll put Blake Green at Halfback who'll have an outstanding year.

 

[Simon]

Seymour has always played his best football when he's not playing halfback, actually. He was a junior five-eighth back in Brisbane and had to play halfback because of Lockyer. He did okay at times but generally he was a failure there and was released. He's been really good for Cronulla at five-eighth but was has been extremely inconsistent when they've tried him at 7, even in reserve grade. Again, he's played a couple of okay games as any five-eighth playing halfback behind a good pack will, but he's shown no real aptitude to organise or direct a team around the park.

I like Seymour and Barrett as five-eighths, but neither of them are halfbacks and the combination will be a disaster AFAIC.

Yeh I agree I've said it a hundred times Seymour is a five-eighth not a halfback, however he did play really well in the 7 when Kimmorely was out last year and I think he has matured as a player, its easy to forget that he was 17/18 when he first started playing in the NRL and then he had a few horror injuries, its hard for any young halfback to play with coinfidence given the situation he was in.

I think we'll see the best from him in the 7 this year.

 

[Craig]

Think its time for my season predictions, these are usually horribly way off so basically just tip the opposite and you'll do just fine.

1 Cronulla Sharks
2 Manly Sea Eagles
3 Canberra Raiders
4 Melbourne Storm
5 St George Illawarra Dragons
6 New Zealand Warriors
7 Newcastle Knights
8 Canterbury Bulldogs
9 Brisbane Broncos
10 North Queensland Cowboys
11 Parramatta Eels
12 Gold Coast Titans
13 Penrith Panthers
14 Sydney Roosters
15 South Sydney Rabbitohs
16 Wests Tigers

Premiers: Manly Sea Eagles
Runners Up: St George Illawarra Dragons
Prelim Finals: Canberra Raiders and Cronulla Sharks
Dally M Medal: Terry Campese
Clive Churchill Medal: Matt Orford
Leading Point Scorer: Terry Campese
Leading Try Scorer: Brett Stewart
Origin Debuts: NSW Terry Campese, Michael Jennings, Glenn Stewart Qld - David Shillington
State of Origin - Queensland 2-1
Rookie of the Year: Ryan Williamson, Josh Dugan or Wayde Dunley
Buy of the year: Michael Ennis or Trent Barrett

Other
* Todd Carney will sign for the Wests Tigers
* Matthew Elliott will get sacked as Panthers coach
* Craig Bellamay will quit as NSW coach after the Origin series
* Cronulla will lose less than three games before Origin 1
* Melbourne will have one of the best defences but will struggle to score points
* An injury crisis will hit the Broncos seeing them crash out of the 8
* Karmichael Hunt will leave Brisbane and sign with Union (either Reds or France)
* Cory Paterson will emerge as a star early in the season and be unlucky to miss Origin selection
* Injuries hit Parramatta again exposing their lack of depth
* The bottom four clubs all finish within three wins of each other.
* Craig Fitzgibbon will retire from the NRL
* Robbie Farah will leave the Wests Tigers
* Nathan Friend will return to the Broncos

 

[Simon]

Excellent start yes.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

The year is still young.

 

[Craig]

The year is still young.

The way I look at it, if you make enough predictions, you will get one right eventually

 

[NUFAN]

Buy of the year will be De Gois imo really underrated player and I'm gutted we've let him go

Yeah I can see De Gois being a real standout from dummy half this year behind a big, quality pack like the Knights have.

As for rookie of the year, I am going to go for the Cowboys Donald Malone. He's a 22 year old speedster who plays in the centres. He's played in the QLD Cup in the past few years and dominated. He's the nephew of Steve Renouf, hope he's similar to Pearl..

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

The way I look at it, if you make enough predictions, you will get one right eventually

I meant in relation to Farah leaving. French Rugby's only a phone call away.

 

[luffy]

I'm hoping Simon's predictions are right and Raiders do finish 3rd!

Would be over the moon with that.

 

[.matt]

With Simon's prediction I'll probably swap Stgeorge with Canberra. We are more then capable of making the top 4 this year.

Bennett, Smith, Boyd, Costigan, Pea, Head, Priddis, Weymen. We have a great backline, foward line and half options.

 

[Johnners]

With Simon's prediction I'll probably swap St Brisbane with Canberra. We are more then capable of making the top 4 this year.

Bennett, Smith, Boyd, Costigan, Pea, Head, Priddis, Weymen. We have a great backline, foward line and half options.

 

[.matt]

Might as well be

 

[Simon]

With Simon's prediction I'll probably swap Stgeorge with Canberra. We are more then capable of making the top 4 this year.

Bennett, Smith, Boyd, Costigan, Pea, Head, Priddis, Weymen. We have a great backline, foward line and half options.

I've actually put the Dragons that high cause I agree with you but I cant see them doing any better than fifth.

Bennett - Great coach will make a big difference to the players attitude, we'll see improvements from the existing players like Hornby, Cooper, Young, Creagh and Poore and thats why the team will go a bit better.

Smith - Is decent, not game breaking imo but compliments Young and Creagh well in the back row.

Boyd - Is very average imo. Looked ok but not great in a good back ground, hard to see him being a star ever.

Costigan - Has attitude problems, from his time in Canberra I can tell you he's not popular with anyone. Is reasonable on the few times hes not injured or suspended.

Paea - Is a bench player really, dont think he'll develop into anything more than a fringe player.

Head - Has missed the boat, pretty sure youll see 6 Soward 7 Hornby all year

Priddis - Past his best, dont think we'll see anything extrodinary from him.

Weyman - The best signing but thats only if hes fit and got his head on, so thats a very big IF.

I think the Dragons have potential in their own backyard, the toyota cup side was decent and I think we'll see little impact from the signings. Matt Prior is a very good player too I think, will be a break out year for him.

 

[.matt]

Yeah I agree with a lot of them but I think Boyd is quite good. Although I was curious to why we signed him, we had Brett and Josh Morris, Nightingale, Sailor, Lett and Hornby who could all play in the win spots. But then we got rid of Josh. I would rather Josh then Boyd.

When head was with us he was injured all the time. I love seeing Hornby at 7, in 06 we always seemed to win with him in their. Soward is great, so he'll stay at 6. Head and Soward would be a good comination though if injuries make it that way

Jeremy Smith is an international, and he's ok but I rate Creagh and Young ahea of him.

Weymen fills in for Ryles, but I would much rather Ryles althiugh if we had Ryles I doubt we would have Bennett so i'm not complaining much. If we have Poore and Weyman as our starting props that's very intimidating.

Priddis fills our need for the hooker role though

Agree with Paea and Costigan. Weymen has attitude problems too though.

1.Nightingale
2.Boyd
3. Sailor/Morris
4.Cooper
5.Morris/Sailor
6.Soward
7.Hornby
13.Smith/Stanely/Scott
12.Creagh
11.Young
10.Weyman
9.Priddis
9.Poore

14.Prior/Paea/Saffy
15.Hunt
16. Scott
17. Costigan

I would say that's our best line-up. It's debatable though. There isn't a lot of room for Saffy, Stanley, Scott, Prior, Paea, Hunt, Costigan, Thorby, Smith to all fit in the lock spot and 4 bench spots lol.

I think Cronulla will be strong this year again, as much as it pains me to say it. Their foward line is strong and they have got some good signings in the off season. Canberra have a good pack too, so I see why you put them at 3 but that might be a little high imo.

 

[Simon]

People say the Raiders struggle because they dont really have stars, but as we saw last year it worked to their advantage because it allowed them to have more depth than every other team. Even this year they have a mountain of forwards who could do the job, I see their pack looking like this

8 Dane Tilse
9 Glen Buttriss
10 David Shillington
11 Bronson Harrison
12 Joe Picker
13 Alan Tongue
Bench
14 Stuart Flanagan
15 Thom Learoyd Lahrs
16 Trevor Thurling
17 Troy Thompson

With back ups then of
Josh Miller
Nigel Plum
Glen Turner
Scott Logan
Nick Skinner
Joel Thompson
Shaun Fensom

IMO thats comfortably more forwards depth than any team in the NRL.

 

[chaminda_00]

Even with a few losses I still think our depth is right up there with the best in the comp.

8. J Perry
9. M Ballin
10. B Kite
11. A Watmough
12. G Hall
13. G Stewart

14. H L'Estrange
15. J King
16. T Williams
17. C Bailey

Others

A Cuthbertson
S Rodney
J Waerea-Hargreaves
V Mauro
G Rose

It does drop off a bit, but at the top end there lots of depth.

 

[NUFAN]

People say the Raiders struggle because they dont really have stars, but as we saw last year it worked to their advantage because it allowed them to have more depth than every other team. Even this year they have a mountain of forwards who could do the job, I see their pack looking like this

8 Dane Tilse
9 Glen Buttriss
10 David Shillington
11 Bronson Harrison
12 Joe Picker
13 Alan Tongue
Bench
14 Stuart Flanagan
15 Thom Learoyd Lahrs
16 Trevor Thurling
17 Troy Thompson

With back ups then of
Josh Miller
Nigel Plum
Glen Turner
Scott Logan
Nick Skinner
Joel Thompson
Shaun Fensom

IMO thats comfortably more forwards depth than any team in the NRL.

That is a heap of depth for sure. I love Josh Miller, I think he's fantastic, does many good hit ups and is fantastic off the bench, so I would be annoyed if he didn't play. I guess he'll come straight in when Learoyd gets injured again.

 

[Simon]

That is a heap of depth for sure. I love Josh Miller, I think he's fantastic, does many good hit ups and is fantastic off the bench, so I would be annoyed if he didn't play. I guess he'll come straight in when Learoyd gets injured again.

Yeh definitely think Miller should be in the 17, it's hard to ignore TLL cause he is absolutely devastating when he's fit and in form. Miller and Thurling a pretty similar though and Thurling was absolutely gun at the back end of 08 so he will be on the bench. On ability I'd probably have Miller in the side in front of Troy Thompson but he will certainly be in there.

 

[NUFAN]

Yeh definitely think Miller should be in the 17, it's hard to ignore TLL cause he is absolutely devastating when he's fit and in form. Miller and Thurling a pretty similar though and Thurling was absolutely gun at the back end of 08 so he will be on the bench. On ability I'd probably have Miller in the side in front of Troy Thompson but he will certainly be in there.

Yeah exactly. I was annoyed to read that Thompson was part of the leadership group as Miller is better, but I'm a big Miller fan so probably biased.

I rate him higher than Tilse too, maybe Furner has some different ideas.

 

[Simon]

Yeah exactly. I was annoyed to read that Thompson was part of the leadership group as Miller is better, but I'm a big Miller fan so probably biased.

I rate him higher than Tilse too, maybe Furner has some different ideas.

Thompson has been part of the leadership group for about 3-4 years, was between he and Tongue for the captaincy when Schifcofske left. Pretty sure last year the leadership group was Tongue, Thompson, Turner and Carney.

Thompson is very well liked here, probably the most popular player in the squad, he trains hard and doesnt make many errors I guess thats why he's always going to be in the team.