2021 Season Results:
Head-to-Head Tipping: 145/196 (74%) (Last week: 3/4)
2020 Season Results:
Head-to-Head Tipping: (74%)
2019 Season Results:
Head-to-Head Tipping: (64%)
2018 Season Results:
Head-to-Head Tipping: (58%)
Line Betting: (46%)
2017 Season Results:
Head-to-Head Tipping: 66%
Line Betting: 55%
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- Sea Eagles
- Panthers
Notes
- You can’t say we didn’t warn you. Last week, we went into some detail explaining how the Sea Eagles‘ gaudy attacking numbers have come exclusively against sub-par defenses, highlighting how in 7 starts against above average defenses, the Eagles have yet to score more than 3 tries in a match and average a pedestrian 13 points-per-game. You can now stretch that out to 8 starts after Melbourne held Manly to just 2 tries and 12 points in a Week One finals walkover. The bad news for Manly fans is that this week’s opponents, the Roosters, are also an above-average D. The good news, though (if you want to call it that) is that the Roosters’ D is also incredibly inconsistent. In 2021, the Roosters have turned in 7 shockingly bad defensive clunkers (against Wests, NQ – twice – Brisbane, Gold Coast, St George-Illawarra and Souths). In these 7 starts, the Roosters posted numbers that would place them firmly among the Bottom 4, conceding 4.5 tries per game, with a LBCVOA of 24.83% (which would be 2nd-last in the NRL extrapolated across the season), a RMCVOA of 3.89% (4th-last) and a TBCVOA of 27.70% (dead last). Funnily enough, they actually won 5 of those games, but that’s not the point. Rather, we want to highlight how good they are when they’re do turn up to play. You see, across the remaining 18 games – a selection of games that interestingly includes 4 games against Top-4 ranked offenses, including Manly – they average just 3 tries conceded per game, with a LBCVOA of -33.41% (2nd), a RMCVOA of -3.70% (5th) and a TBCVOA of -0.54% (8th). What we’re painting here is a picture of a Jekyll-and-Hyde defense, that roughly 30% of the time turns up and embarrasses itself (including against some pretty mediocre football teams), but the other 70% of the season has been gold-plated elite (despite facing some of the very best footy teams). It’s fair to assume that Trent Robinson is aware of this fact, and it’s also fair to say that he considers Sam Walker’s weak defense a significant contributor. Through Weeks 10-14, the Roosters turned in 3 of their stinkers, with the only exception – their 44-16 win over the Raiders – coming in the one game Walker didn’t play. And since their recent shellacking at the hands of South Sydney, Walker has found himself relegated to the bench. We don’t want to sound too critical of Walker – he’s only a teenager, and is already one of the best attacking weapons in the league – but it’s extremely unusual to see a coach hook their best attacking weapon (Walker averages almost 2 try involvements and 1.5 line break assists per game) just weeks out from the finals. However, with Walker possessing an unacceptable tackle efficiency of 76% and leaking 17 line breaks in 20 starts (Lachlan Lam and Drew Hutchison have a combined 15 conceded from 38 starts), it’s not hard to see what Robbo’s going for. Which is all a long way of saying that the Roosters absolutely do have the defensive capability to stop Manly’s offense on Friday night. In fact, we’d argue that there’s so little between these sides, there’s every chance that this game comes down to who can earn the most possession and field position. For this reason – and this reason alone – we’re leaning Manly, largely because the Roosters’ handling is so consistently dreadful (they’ve made double-digit errors in all but 4 games this season) that it’s hard to have any faith in them maintaining possession. But please don’t consider this a forgone conclusion, and we’d advising staying well away from Manly at their current $1.30 price (if anything, we’d take the $4 on Sydney). If the “good” Roosters turn up (or, if Manly lob up and wet the bed for a second time), Sydney are absolutely good enough to get home here.
- In contrast, we’re giving the Eels approximately zero chance of winning against the Panthers on Saturday night. No doubt Penrith will have been disappointed by last week’s result, but they should take heart from the fact their attacking VOAs were better than every side that played on the weekend (Melbourne included), while their D once again kept an elite offense completely in check. The reason Penrith lost had nothing to do with bad fundamentals, but rather was just ‘one of those days’ – they created more try-scoring opportunities than you could poke a stick at, only to see the final pass fall tantalisingly out of reach over and over and over again. It’s extraordinarily unusual to see a team make 5 line breaks yet be held to a single try (a try which actually came off a kick, anyway), but them’s the breaks. We’d be far more concerned if they’d failed to crack the Rabbitohs’ defense at all. If Penrith can put 5 breaks through a vastly superior Bunnies defense on just a 47% possession share, we shudder to think what they’re capable of doing to Parramatta – especially if their possession share returns to normal (Penrith have earned 50% or more of the footy in a whopping 19 of 25 matches this season). Last weekend, the Eels got gashed for 4 tries and 4 line breaks by the 3rd-worst offense in the competition, while dominating possession 52-48. This marked their 9th game in a row with a below-average LBCVOA – the longest such streak in the competition (that includes the already-eliminated defensive patsies like Wests and the Cowboys). There’s absolutely no way that this standard of defense will get it done here. The Panthers’ own D has conceded more than 2 tries in a game just 8 times all season, and more than 3 tries only twice. If Parra aren’t likely to get anywhere near 20 points, they simply can not afford to present Penrith with the volume of opportunities that they’ve been giving everyone else. Parramatta got extraordinarily lucky in beating Melbourne three weeks ago, and we suppose that win will give them confidence that they can get it done again here. That hubris will likely be short-lived though, as they learn that simply hoping for wins to be handed to them does not a viable strategy make.
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