You were all plugging for White before SOO1 - and he had his face \"legally\" rearranged. All the same it does bring into question his toughness. None of 'our' boys stood up for mine and Kite's metres must have been poor even with just 30 mins. Ryan did nothing. I've seen Noddy have some great games for Australia but that was back in '05. Matt King is on the wing so Qld can swing it wide and catch him out of position again and again :roll:
I don't know why I am so upset, certainly not surprised, but they were so easily outclassed. No excuses if we get done this game and only history is on our side.
I wasn't keen on White in Origin 1. Especially less so when I saw he was starting. He had a good city/country game, but that wasn't enough in my books.
I thought all three of the Manly players had poor Origin one games, Kite arguably the best. He was the go-to forward at the start (White was nowhere, Mason's hits the flanks, Hindmarsh is a 5m man, Bobcat was strong), taking on the entire Queensland pack until Bull Bailey came on. But he did get picked up a few times and was dominated.
I thought Bobcat had a bloody good game in Origin one. Strong defence (and top tackler in the game, ahead of Hindmarsh ffs), decent metres (more than White, Hindmarsh, Tupou, Costigan, Lillyman, Kaufusi, Johnson, Myles and Carroll) and his touch in Cooper's try has clearly gone completely unnoticed - I know Mullen passed the ball, but Ryan's work in that try has been critically underrated IMO.
He's twice the player Gallen is. How many times could Gallen go for a blind-side dummy half run in Origin to get his metres up? Like, once? After that he'd be picked off every time by blokes like Costigan and Johnson who would be lurking there waiting to smash him into touch for taking the cat option.
Matt King was poor in defence on Origin 1, but he's had plenty of good games on the wing in Rep games. I'm happy to leave him there.
The biggest thing for NSW is the opening 15 minutes (as it always is in any Origin game). In the first 15 minutes of Origin 1 White got his nose smashed (ruled out any proper involvement for the rest of the game), Mason injured his hammy (same effect) and Kite copped some big hits and went missing. That's what it boiled down to.
Even when White was on the field he wasn't really there. He was in backplay every third tackle getting his nose patched up - which either left a hole in the defensive line, or meant that there was one less forward on the field to take a hitup. Mase played on with his hammy injury for a bit, much to the same effect. Then he went off and effectively NSW were 2 starting forwards down and one missing (Kite).
Unless this happens again, I'll back NSW to win the forwards battle in the opening exchanges for Origin 2 - which will lead them to winning the game.
