What is this ? Year 12 English exams ?
Who knows if our backline is the worst in the NRL, we don't play the style of game that allows us to find out how. Our strength is our forwards, especially our backrow, so this is where we play.
Now this is "Chicken or Egg" territory. Do we play a strong no nonsense forward game because our backline is crap. Or do our backs just not get an opportunity to shine because our strength is in the forwards, and if it ain't broke don't fix it.
Stewart has shown that he has talent, and more importantly he has that desirable commodity called speed. Donald is a proven finisher, and quick also. Hicks was one of our best last year, but has been disappointing this season to date (lack of opportunity perhaps).
I personally feel that the weak link in attack has been our centres, and also the halves passing game. Hill and Steppa would be lucky to have 5 line breaks between them. Monas prefers the inside ball, flat pass to wider running backrower, or take on line play. Not a big distributor of the ball, or good at a giving his outside men room (or time in a lot of cases).
But when we have guys like BK, Choc, Beaver and potentially Harris, why not stick to a game plan based around these guys. Maybe Stewart, Hicks and Donald need to get more involved and start to sniff around the ruck and look for balls off these guys, or give Monas another option (although I'm not sure that he is up to having too many options). Stewart does it, but Hicks and Donald seem content to restrict their input to dummy half runs and cooling their heels on the wing. Let Tezza and Steppa, do the bulk of the junk runs out of dummy half.
I did like Alberts' willingness to take on his man, and he did make a couple of "almost" line breaks. However this may need to be taken with a grain of salt, given that it was South Sydney. It would be nice to see him get another opportunity, and I would assume that it will be this week. Why not give Mattai and Alberts a run together.
I think our backline is OK, just lacking a quality centre probably, and maybe they are short of a good gallop. Ideally it would be nice if we could get out to a good start against the Knights with our "normal" game plan. Then when we are 14 - 20 ahead, start to play a bit more of an expansive game to give the boys a run and to try and give them a bit of confidence. Probably won't happen though, with Johns and Buderus back, Newcastle won't be any pushovers this week.