#but honourable mention goes to The Black Island where he spent most of the time wearing a kilt and knee socks

[airyairyaucontraire]

do you ever stop and assess your outfit based on how easy or difficult it would make things for you if an adventure began today?

[theseaeaglelives]

Round 12

THE SEA EAGLE

MAKING RUGBY LEAGUE GREAT AGAIN!!!

Round 12   Manly Sea Eagles                              12   Defeated by.   Penrith Panthers                               15

  Trivia Question – What do Bob Fulton, Max Krillich, Paul Vautin, Geoff Toovey and Joel Thompson have in common?

Answer – All have been bestowed with the honour of captaining the mighty maroon and white that is the Manly-Warringah RLFC. Unfortunately for poor old Joel that is where the similarities end, his predecessors all being Club legends, premiership winners, Kangaroo reps and in the case of Bob Fulton, an immortal.

Joel Thomson, whilst this year under Des Hasler is having his best season in the NRL, can only be described as a journeyman having spent most of his playing career at the Dragons and most of his Manly tenure under the tutelage of the ill-fated Trent Barrett regime. These credentials hardly the ingredients of a successful Manly captain and Joel’s deficiencies were laid bare in the 10th minute when Manly were awarded a penalty well within kicking range. With instructions from the coaching box to take the easy 2pts, the on-field decision was to press on for the try which predictably ended in nothing. Strangely the decision to forgo the shot for penalty was applauded by all and sundry in the Fox commentary team. 

Fair dinkum, these so called experts, who should know better, need to get a grip and realise that with a player roster like Manly’s at present, winning games takes precedence over the possibility (not probability as with taking the 2) of scoring tries.

Further opportunities to take the 2pts in the following 10 minutes were also declined by Manly, with such decisions coming back to bite in the overall outcome as it would take Manly until the 70th minute to open their points account. In the absence of their main attacking weapons, Cherry Baby, Jake and Tommy Turbo ….. and Lachlan Croker, Manly have very little to offer in terms of offence and the on-field leadership group need to recognise that early points are gold, and should be taken at all and every opportunity.

Penrith on the other hand, recognising their own deficiencies opened the scoring after 20 minutes when they wisely took an easy penalty from in front. Getting the ball back from the kick off (as is the case when you convert a penalty), the Panthers then fashioned a long range try from the ensuing set and the lead was extended to 8-zip. A late Panthers field goal resulted in a well deserved 9-0 lead to the home team at the break.

The early part of the second half was a mistake-athon, with both sides showing very scant respect for ball security in a display that would not be out of place in the NSW Cup. Memo to Abbas Miske (and to a lesser extent Dylan Walker)  - a 30 metre cross field run is not a 30 metre carry and whilst running sideways may be the big thing in reserve grade, in the NRL you will get mauled like a BBQ sausage dangled in front of a pack of Labradors.

Down 15-0 with only 10 minutes to play Manly finally started to play some football and tries to Manese Fanua and Cade Cust (both converted) provided some hope of a revival but in the end, it was too little, too late.

In the past 2 weeks Manly have been put to the sword by the Titans and Panthers, both of whom were running last going in the respective fixtures. Whilst the effort is still there, to some extent Manly have hit the wall and the challenge for Coach Des Hasler is to get them back on track for next week’s clash with the Cowboys.

None of this can be placed at Des Hasler’ feet. This is a Trent Barrett squad, and poor old Des has been given the largest of hospital passes to try and form this side into a top 8 team at best, and avoid the spoon as a bare minimum.

Quote of the night goes to Fox Sports commentator, Yvonne Sampson, (who possibly can be excused if indeed it transpires that she knows no better) when she said words to the effect “the great thing about these origin effected games is that we see the emergence of players that perhaps would not have normally had the opportunity in the top grade”.

As far as the Sea Eagle is concerned if watching a bunch of reserve graders run around masquerading as NRL players floats your boat so be it, but surely a better spectacle for viewers and paying fans would be the inclusion of players of the calibre of Trjobevic Cherry Baby, Nathan Cleary and co.

With that said, the Sea Eagle has now permanently banned all NRL fixtures from viewing until the Origin series is over, and the clubs and their best players have had a significant rest to make the competition worthwhile. If all the rugby league being public took a similar view, ratings would plummet, and the NRL would then have to consider a complete rethink of the way Origin interacts with the general competition. The time has come for Origin only standalone rounds and no NRL. What is being dished up as NRL now is poor, very poor and basically unwatchable, not too mention fans being deprived of seeing the best squads compete.

Players union to open ‘faith’ review as fallout deepens

RUPA will establish and undertake an Expression of Faith & Beliefs Review after Israel Folau’s controversial sacking.Source: AP

The rugby players’ union (RUPA) is to set up a committee to review how players can express their faith and beliefs after the Israel Folau sacking saga. RUPA said on Tuesday the decision to tear up Folau’s Rugby Australia contract was “a sad outcome for Israel, his family, friends, teammates, opponents and all associated with rugby in Australia and around the world.” It also said Rugby Australia had not yet provided any clear parameters to the players specifying how it expects them to express their faith and beliefs in a way it considers acceptable.

“To address this, RUPA will immediately establish and undertake an Expression of Faith & Beliefs Review alongside its players, incorporating advice from those with and without strong religious beliefs,” RUPA said in a statement. RUPA is aiming to hold a first meeting of the review committee when the Super Rugby and World Sevens series seasons end and plan to invite representatives of Rugby Australia and a Super Rugby, urging them to take part.

Folau was sacked for a high-level code breach for a religiously-motivated social media post which said hell awaits homosexuals, among others, after he had previously been warned following a similar post last year.

“RUPA appreciates the difficult position which this incident has placed on Israel’s teammates and the broader professional playing group, and we will continue to support each RUPA member,” it said.

Sea Eagle Comment – this is the greatest load of gibberish tripe that the Sea Eagle has ever come across. If reviews are necessary how about Rugby Australia conducting the following

Review No 1. Why is there such a proliferation of Pacific Islanders in the Wallabies squad. At last count no less than 13 of the current squad were either born in the Pacific Islands or have very close ancestral heritage. When one of your props is known as the Tongan Thor (aka Tanelia Topou) something is inherently wrong and prompts the obvious question. Why is this man not playing for Tonga?? Let’s face it the Pacific Islanders are only playing because of the greater remuneration available for playing for the Wallabies as opposed to lining up for their countries of birth. If the governing body of world rugby was fair dinkum there would be greater (financial) incentives made available to facilitate this. The Sea Eagle also suggests that a West Indies style concept team should be formed out of the Pacific Islands (comprising from players from Samao, Tonga Fiji etc.) and be eligible for the World Cup. Such a team, at full strength would be more than competitive, would easily account for the Wallabies, most northern hemisphere teams and probably give the All-Blacks a run for their money. Of course this will never happen due to the vested interests of existing rugby world power-brokers, concerned that their own teams would (rightfully) be weakened to such an extent that they would become even more uncompetitive.

Such a move would decimate the Wallabies squad leading to the second review.

Review No 2.  Where did all the non-Pacific Islander rugby players go? A generation or so ago, the Wallabies squad was predominantly comprised of a talented array of players coming up through the Private School system (think Eales, Farr-Jones, Campese etc.) with a sprinkling of naturally gifted indigenous players (think the Ella bros). The indigenous component still exists but other traditional pathways seem to have fallen by the wayside. Simply put, in the Sea Eagle’s opinion the youth of today and especially those young men coming through the private school system have gone soft and would prefer at all cost to avoid any form of physical contact, and even more so when said physical contact involves a 100-120kg Tongan. These days the main form of activity for these young men involve an over exposure to Fortnite and the highest risk of injury being some form of RSI from streaming too much internet (possibly Youporn but who knows).

NSW Origin- the Return of Trent Barrett

Congratulations to Cherry Baby for this achievement. His CV is rolled gold. Premiership winner, Clive Churchill medallist in a losing GF team, captain of Manly, Queensland representative and now Captain of Queensland, and Australian test player. And that is before we take a look at his obvious contract negotiating genius, given the way he played both the Titans and Manly off a break to execute one of the most if not the most highly paid player contracts for a significantly long-term deal, with Manly.

It has been reported in the media that NSW has appointed ex Manly coach Trent Barrett to assist the team, the sole purpose of which apparently, is to guide NSW as to the deficiencies of Cherry Baby, the Queensland half and Captain. If this is true, then goodbye NSW.

Let us then compare the Cherry Baby CV to that of Trent Barrett. Trent Barrett: No premierships as player or coach, no Clive Churchill Medal, player for the losing Saints and the Sharks, and when coach of Manly, he was himself played off a break when he tried to manoeuvre a payout by terminating his contract early, only to find himself being paid to do nothing whilst he coaching aspirations at another club evaporated before his eyes. Granted, Trent Barrett played Origin for NSW, but then again so did Phil Duke, Ryan O’Hara, Michael Gordon, Jamal Idris, Keith Galloway, Michael Buettner, Don McKinnon, Gary Hambly, Rex Wright, Barry Jensen, Aaron Raper and Jarrod Mullen.

Well done NSW. If you want to win the 2019 Origin series, what better way to do it than this.

NSW Origin- Indigenous Players Won’t Sing The National Anthem

This brou hah ha has got everyone talking. Certain Indigenous NSW players are saying they won’t sing the national anthem on Origin night. They are of course still happy to take the coin for playing, and happy to get the extra coin being an Origin player with NRL clubs. And no doubt, happy to play for Australia if selected.

Given Origin is presumably for Australian players only, if the indigenous players do not want to be associated with Australia, they should at least be consistent about it. They can join the Kiwis, English and islander players in the NRL who are not playing Origin because presumably, they do not associate themselves as Australian.

Of course, from an NRL viewpoint it is perfectly fine to say you won’t sing the national anthem. Heaven help you though, if you express your religious beliefs about the LGBT community. Do that and not only won’t you play Origin, you won’t play NRL. At least that seems to be the position of NRL Chairman Peter Beattie vis a vis Izzy Folau.

If the Sea Eagle had his way, and there would be many who would say thankfully he doesn’t, the only excuse for not singing the national anthem, is a demonstrated inability to sing in key. There would be pre game rehearsals for this purpose to be judged by the Director of Controversy to ascertain said poor singing ability.

Anyone else who refused to sing the national anthem at Origin would get the big permanent banning, unless they chose to trial on the Voice by singing said anthem, for public viewing to show their contrition.

The banning is easily enough achieved as well. Simply pick someone else and say it is based on form or for the betterment of the team.

THE SEA EAGLE