telling us to take unders on Monday night?

Its because of the wrestle, teams are allowed to wrestle, turn, rollover and lay on the attacking player, allowing the defenses to set and giving ball players next to no chance of creating.

That is why i would say about 40% of tries are coming off kicks, and a small portion of those tries off kicks where skill (good clean takes) is involved. The rest is this reliance of bat backs, the opp dropping the bomb, bad bounces. Luck factors.

As i said a few weeks ago when i saw that Dogs- Eagles game back in 93 was the reason why i fell in love with the game.

Now it has simply turned into a wrestling match where results are determined by the bounce of the ball.

The game has "weeded out" genuine league ball players.

IMO, Bellamy is the one to blame for this. He revolutionised the game with his wrestling (and the game allowed it), that was the blue print for success, teams then slowly started to adapt where now everyone is doing it. Combine that with the attitude of "lets not lose rather than lets try and win" is making our game an ugly spectacle.

I still remember the days where overs and unders used to be 47.5, 48.5 and even some games were around 53.5........

The game is allowing to much wrestle combine that with the fact that players are much more athletic and can cover more space as a result making it almost impossible for teams to get around defenses.

Around the early to mid 2000's was the perfect BALANCE of attack and defense.

Parra, dogs and Knights and Roosters were the top teams in that part of the decade. they were on top cause of there attack.

The top teams now are Dragons, Storm and Eagles, cause of there defense.

Its about adapting to the evolving and changing interpretations of the rules and pushing them to there limits. That is why Bellamy and Bennet are so good.

It's all cyclical I think. In the coming years, coaches will blow up deluxe about the slow play the ball and refs will start penalising, ignoring markers who aren't square, becoming liberal with the play the balls etc.

Then we'll have 5 or so years of touch football, and coaches will blow up with the fact that defence gets no reward (dominant, surrender) and coaches like Bellyache will make it an art form and we'll all be bitching about the rush of unders in the NRL.

That is why i am out of most things next season and beyond is to see what impact Bennett has on Mullen.

IMO, Mullen is a player who has been badly coached. This is the difference between Bennett and most other coaches. Bennett recognises the skillset of the player and maximises it to its potential. He doesnt try and make the player something that they arent naturally.

Soward never had a good pass on him, its not his natural game, He is a runner, organiser and fantastic kicker. Before Bennett, Soward was "average" at these even though it was his natural gift. He is now fantastic at executing these.

Mullen on the other hand naturally has an outstanding if not the best pass from left to right. I put him in the same sentence as Kevin Walters in this regard. Mullen has an ability like walters to beat the opposition centre with his outstanding face ball which is extremely difficult to execute but when done is basically impossible to stop. How many times have we seen Mullen do it this year? I havent. It seems as though it is being coached out of him. The Knights coach is trying to make him something he is not.

If Mullen stays fit, he will win a Dally M or go extremely close to one a few years into Bennetts regime.

Fuck me dead Rostos, you are making complete sense

fwiw, I agree completely. In Mullen's young junior days, he was carving it up as a centre who could ball play and had a good kicking game. He scored something like 70 tries in a junior season for the Taree Panthers.

He naturally moved in one slot to 5/8, where he captained the Knights to the 2004 SG Ball Premiership and played 5/8 for the Junior Kangaroos (outside Mitchell Pearce, incidentally).

He has been lambasted as inconsistent (with reason, too) ever since Andrew Johns retired and he was annointed the Newcastle No. 7, the day after his 20th birthday. Since then he has either played outside bums like Walsh and Dureau, or at halfback with bums outside him like Rogers and Henry.

I think he is best suited to play second receiver, even though there is little difference between the modern day halve positions. His game has been stifled first by Smith, now Stone. He's at his best when he takes the line on (which, he is very underrated at) and throws those face balls across the oppossition centre.

He is wasted turning forwards back inside straight at the A defenders in meaningless one out plays.

I look foward to his development under Wayne next year.

Nah, I'll keep betting overs like a muppet and bitch when I lose

Yep, that was as blatant as the Melbourne wrestle

Natural though, that teams try and mimic what's successful.