Sydney Roosters woes, Josh Addo-Carr latest and finals footy: the NRL 7-Tackle Set

The finals are here and they have started with a bang.

Penrith and Melbourne did the business with relative ease in the first two games, but the two straight knockout matches were crackers, culminating in an all-timer at Accor Stadium on Sunday as Manly came from behind to defeat the Bulldogs.

The night prior, North Queensland advanced despite a Kalyn Ponga masterclass for Newcastle.

The Cowboys now face Cronulla, who were a distant second best to the Storm, and Manly face the Roosters, themselves humbled by the Panthers.

It’s all agogo in the NRL – here’s how Finals Week 1 went down.

A good week for…

Sunday saw one of the best advertisements for the NRL in years, with a crowd of over 50,000 turning out to watch the Bulldogs’ first finals appearance in a million years against a Manly side that, ultimately, knew too much.

The event itself was a selling point, but the game more than matched it: Canterbury dominated early on thanks to their now-trademark suffocating pressure in defence, only for Manly’s attack to win the day.

These aren’t the best two sides in the comp, but they are almost certainly the most tactically interesting.

All year, the Dogs have eschewed size in the middle and have forged a defensive unit based on line speed and men around the ruck, while the Sea Eagles’ philosophy of ‘live attack’ has seen them overwhelm opponents with constant movement and speed with ball in hand.

In the end, attack beat defence.

With the Dogs ahead and the game on the line, Daly Cherry-Evans and Luke Brooks produced one of the planned moves of the year to halve the deficit, before DCE and a clearly-injured Tom Trbojevic sparked some of that live attack to pull off a breathtaking, ad-lib try.

Both sides played well and, in the final stages, it was the massive experience gap that saw the Sea Eagles home. Bulldogs coach Cameron Ciraldo, in the post-match presser, pointed to the 1,000+ games of experience in the Manly spine. He wasn’t wrong. That was the difference.

A bad week for…

We should be talking about the supreme showing from Penrith, who all-but ended their match with the Roosters before the 20 minute mark thanks to a near-perfect start.

Instead, we focus on Easts and their inability to make any impact at all against the Panthers. Their record is woeful, with now ten straight defeats to Ivan Cleary’s men, and if they are at all serious about winning anything, that has to change.

The Roosters are a great team with an all-time great coach, but the way the Panthers play appears to be kryptonite to them. Now, it’s do-or-die at home to a Manly side that have nothing to lose.

The Sea Eagles beat the Roosters at home and lost away, though the encounter at Allianz Stadium was very close and, had it not been for two in-game injuries to Manly outside backs, might have gone another way. It should be a belter.

Standout

Though Newcastle lost, it’s impossible to look past Kalyn Ponga.

The fullback has been accused of going missing in the past, but he was head and shoulders above the pack on Saturday night in Townsville.

North Queensland were unconvincing and Viliami Vailea, in particular, will be having nightmares about Ponga’s step, which left him looking very silly indeed on several occasions.

Had Dane Gagai not massacred a late opportunity, we’d be talking about Ponga’s masterclass even more, but despite having the game put on a silver plate for him by his captain, the former Queensland centre fluffed his lines.

Washout

Josh Addo-Carr, who is on the chopping block at Canterbury after another drugs scandal. The Foxx tested positive for cocaine after a random road test and might well have his contract ripped up as a result.

The Test winger had insisted that he had not taken anything during the delay between his first and second tests, but stood himself down from the Doggies’ clash with Manly to avoid overshadowing such a big event.

Naturally, that had the opposite effect and he was the story throughout the build-up. Now, following the second test results, Canterbury have free rein to fire the Foxx.

That suits the club down to the ground. Addo-Carr is a great player but the Bulldogs knowingly overpaid to get him out of Melbourne as part of changing the narrative at the club and turning it into a destination for elite players.

That part of the deal has been achieved and now, they’re saddled with an expensive contract in a non-essential position, while also having a decent option coming through in Blake Wilson.

If the Dogs can cut Addo-Carr loose and use his wages to pay a halfback, they’ll be in business. Watch out for the Foxx coming to a Parramatta or Wests Tigers near you soon.

Everyone is talking about…

Stadiums, just for a change.

Nothing sells in Sydney like a good debate over who gets to play where, and finals is a bumper time of year for such topics, especially when it can be combined with some good old fashioned code wars.

Invariably, that involves Cronulla, who want to play their knockout match against the Cowboys at their own ground, bringing them into direct confrontation with the NRL, who insist that all games after the first week are played at big venues.

A move to the Roosters’ Allianz Stadium was the obvious choice, as it is on a direct train line from the Sutherland Shire, where the bulk of Sharks supporters live.

Allianz, however, is next door to the Sydney Cricket Ground, where the Sydney Swans will play an AFL preliminary final at the same time on Friday night.

That left the NRL in a real bind.

They could have abandoned their ‘big venue’ policy to appease Cronulla, which would have backfired the next time a club with a similar ground makes this stage – *cough* Manly *cough* – and asks to play at their spiritual home.

They floated using one of the other big venues, Parramatta, which enraged Sharks fans who would have been required to spend over an hour on the train to watch a home match.

The decision to go head-to-head with the Swans does undermine their own policy of avoiding such clashes, as evidenced by moving the Bulldogs-Manly game last week, but it is probably the least worst option.

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But nobody mentions…

The stadium farrago did leave the amusing situation of prominent columnist and Sharks fan Buzz Rothfield arguing in his column for the game to be played in Cronulla – while having made the exact opposite argument when the A-League chose to play its Grand Final at the home of the Central Coast Mariners back in May.

The Mariners had earned home advantage on the field of play and duly sold out their stadium, with temporary seating brought in to satisfy excess demand.

The year prior, there had been widespread protests by soccer fans about the decision to depart from the long-standing Australian soccer tradition that the team which finished top in the regular season earned home advantage in the A-League Grand Final.

The league had sold the rights to the showpiece event to the NSW tourist board, who opted to play the game in Parramatta to much derision.

It was a huge PR own goal from the A-League and they relented, allowing the Mariners to host their year to great success. At the time, Buzz railed against the soccer competition ‘locking out’ fans by not playing at Allianz, a full 50 miles away from the Central Coast.

Penny for his thoughts on how many rugby league fans would have been ‘locked out’ of Cronulla if things had gone his way this weekend.

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Forward pass

Cronulla are again the target as they look to finally end their finals hoodoo against the Cowboys on Friday night.

Their record in the finals is horrendous, with seven consecutive losses in post-season games, and the feeling that Craig Fitzgibbon’s men are flat-track bullies is going nowhere until that is rectified.

A night later, the Roosters will be looking to avoid an embarrassing straight sets exit from the finals against a Manly team with whom they have seriously struggled this year.

As ever, it’ll likely come down to whether Tom Trbojevic is fit. He looked shaky on Sunday but, when it mattered, produced a key play to break the game open. Expect the Chooks to batter him early with kicking and hope to capitalise off the back of it.

The feeling that all four sides are competing for the right to lose to Melbourne and Penrith does persist, but one suspects that the Sea Eagles are the side that both would least like to see hove into view in a week’s time. Watch this space.

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