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NRL Tips – Week 5, 2021

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2021 Season Results:

Head-to-Head Tipping: 25/32 (78%) (Last week: 7/8)

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%

(NOTE: If this is your first visit to the site, be sure to click here for an explanation of what we’re all about.)

  • Rabbitohs
  • Warriors
  • Panthers
  • Titans
  • Storm
  • Roosters
  • Tigers
  • Eels

Notes

  • You could be forgiven for assuming that the Broncos offense struggled mightily against Melbourne last week, and in many respects they did (any time a team is held to just 6 points, it’s not exactly a good day out). But looking beyond the box score, we continue to see positive signs for Brisbane. With another 3 line breaks (achieved on just a 43% possession share), Brisbane average north of 5 per game – a decent accomplishment considering the fact that they’ve faced 2 of the league’s Top 4 defenses during the opening month. Their yardage is solid (3rd best RMVOA in the comp) and their discipline has steadily improved over the past three weeks, culminating in a decent 8-error performance against the Storm. Should they continue to develop, they’re well placed to score 2-to-3 tries against the Rabbitohs – a number that probably still won’t be good enough to win, but should definitely be good enough to make it tough for the Bunnies to beat the spread (-20.5 at time of writing). Though their defense isn’t the worst in the league, it’s been getting repeatedly shredded, with the Broncos conceding 4+ tries against every opponent they’ve faced besides the terminally hopeless Canterbury. What’s unusual about the Broncos though, is that for a defense that’s getting consistently gashed, they don’t have a single glaring weakness. While teams have been able to indulge themselves on Manly’s right edge, for example, or by targeting Canterbury’s Will Hopoate, the Broncos’ lapses have been extremely evenly spread, with some 15 players having conceded at least 1 line break, yet only 2 having conceded more than 2. So if no single player is getting taken advantage of, where are all these tries coming from? The answer is a combination of two things, that are somewhat interrelated. The first problem the Broncos have is an inability to stop opposition run metres. They have the league’s worst RMCVOA (6.98%), the result of a typically placid defensive line. Against the Storm, the first two tries were the direct result of allowing Melbourne to roll downfield with quick play-the-balls, placing individual defenders at a disadvantage (why exactly Patrick Carrigan would allow Justin Olam 15 metres to build up a head of steam is a mystery). With all these extra yards, the Broncos then find themselves on the losing end of the field position battle more often than not – a factor contributing to Melbourne’s third try. Compounding their problems is Brisbane’s inability to wrap the ball up in tackles. They’ve conceded the most offloads of any team in the league so far (52), forcing them to do more work defensively, leading to greater fatigue, and contributing to a slower line speed and more ineffective tackles. Wash, rinse, repeat. This particular combination is absolutely begging for Damien Cook to take advantage of, and we’re expecting him to have a strong showing as Brisbane start wearing down. Brisbane are building, and we give them a better shot than most this week, but they need to show a bit more enthusiasm on D to amke their next step up.
  • Coming into the season, Warriors fans might have been content to come away from the opening four weeks with 2 wins. But as good as those results may have been, their recent defensive form is a bit alarming. After turning in back-to-back stellar defensive efforts to open the season, the Warriors have slipped back into their bad old ways. After posting an impressive LBCVOA of -30.52% in the first two weeks (2nd best in the league), they’ve since come crashing back to earth with a pathetic 26.67% (3rd worst) over the last two. And that’s taking into account the high quality of opponent they’ve been facing – in absolute terms it’s even worse. After conceding 7 line breaks combined across the opening fortnight, they’ve been averaging 7.5 per game since. Their missed tackles have jumped by over 50%. They honestly look like a different football team. Which is great news for a Sea Eagles side struggling for any sort of offensive traction. Manly are yet to score more than 12 points in a game this year, but the way that the Warriors are currently defending, this shapes as as good a chance as ever. But let’s say the Sea Eagles manage to bag a few tries – there’s still the little problem of their D. Manly’s entire right edge is horrific, with Jason Saab, Moses Suli and Daly Cherry-Evans all among the league’s bottom 6 players in line breaks conceded (though Suli is absent here, in what may be a blessing in disguise). Saab in particular has been driving Eagles fans batty, ranking worst in the league for tackle efficiency (32%), tries conceded (10) and line breaks conceded (12). Until Des Hasler does something to get Saab out of the team, we simply can’t get on board with picking Manly, no matter how ordinary the Warriors might be looking. Hopefully once Tom Trbojevic returns, Dylan Walker can slide into the centres and maybe Brad Parker can bump Saab to the curb. In the meantime, Ken Maumalo seems like a reasonable anytime try-scorer option.
  • It should have come as no surprise to see the Raiders return to the winner’s circle against the Titans – it was only injury misfortune that cost them against the Warriors, after all. Canberra play a disciplined, high-percentage style of football (they’ve made the fewest offloads in the league so far) and rarely beat themselves. They’ve looked extremely good so far while putting away mediocre opposition, but the Panthers are a completely different beast to anything Canberra have seen so far. In Penrith, Canberra will be facing a side who’ve run for over 1600m in 3 of their 4 outings this season, and busted at least 38 tackles in every game – including against Melbourne. Against Manly, the Panthers flashed another string in their bow – a willingness to try their hand at second-phase play. The Panthers made a whopping 18 offloads against Manly, while keeping their error count to just 8. This is noteworthy, as the Raiders sole defensive blemish this season – conceding 10 line breaks and 6 tries to the Warriors while reduced to a one-man bench – came while conceding a season-high 19 offloads. If the key to disrupting Canberra is indeed playing an offload-happy brand of football, we now know that the Panthers are capable of it. Even better, they have the option of shifting Charlie Staines to fullback for extended periods during the match. Staines played at the back for all of about 5 minutes against Manly, and instantly lifted the Panthers’ offense up a gear, setting up a try and almost springing Nathan Cleary for another. The last time these sides met, the Panthers dismantled Canberra with a 24-0 first half, and we wouldn’t be surprised to see a similar result here.
  • Popular opinion seems to be that without Mitchell Pearce, the Knights’ season is just about done before it really began. Ok, so they’ve lost Mitch Pearce and Tex Hoy. But they’re also welcoming back Kalyn Ponga and Blake Green to a side that won both their opening games. Sure, Pearce is a fine player, but we’d argue Ponga is more vital to the Knights’ fortunes. After switching out their half and fullback, the only other additional losses here are Kurt Mann and Jacob Saifiti – guys who are decent enough, but hardly move the needle. They’re probably not better than the Titans when the Gold Coast are playing their best, but they’re certainly good enough to capitalise if they don’t – and the Titans have been one of the real Jekyll-and-Hyde sides of 2021. In Weeks 2 & 3, the Titans were unbelievable in demolishing the Broncos and Cowboys, posting 72 points in two weeks. In the other two games though, they’ve combined for just 10. The most frustrating part of it is that for the most part, their wounds have been self-inflicted. The Gold Coast average a woeful 14 errors per game, and in both losses, added a further 11 total penalties per game, to boot. While they’re gifting around 25 extra sets to their opponents they’re giving themselves virtually no chance of competing; but it’s difficult to speculate when exactly the stinkers are going to come. At home against a weakened Newcastle side, we think they’ll turn up; but if they don’t, this Knights group is still plenty good enough to pull their pants down.
  • From there, the rest of the round looks fairly predictable. We don’t see any viable path toward winning for the Bulldogs – they’ll be flat out scoring a point against the Storm, and even if they do somehow jag a couple of tries, they’ve got bugger all chance of slowing down Melbourne’s offense. The Dogs are averaging over 30 points conceded per game, and are facing the #3 offense in the league. This should be a cricket score.
  • Likewise, we quite fancy the Roosters to do it comfortably against the Sharks. While Cronulla lit the scoreboard up against the lowly Cowboys, their underlying attacking fundamentals are still pretty underwhelming. The Sharkies rank last in LBVOA and 2nd-last in RMVOA, which is generally a dire combination. Without line breaks, Cronulla become heavily dependent on scoring from kicks – a scoring method that itself depends on earning field position. If you can’t create line breaks and you can’t work your way down the other end – as was the case in the 1st half against Canberra and the 2nd half against Parramatta – it’s damn near impossible to score. And believe us, they’ll need to score to keep up with the Roosters. Reports of the Roosters’ deaths were more than a little premature, with Sydney turning in a blistering 32-12 effort against New Zealand, in which they posted their best attacking numbers since Round 1. Young stud Sam Walker was absolutely ridiculous on debut, producing 2 try assists and 4 line break assists – both numbers that surpass the three-week total of one of the men he was replacing, Lachlan Lam. The Roosters’ offense is in safe hands, and we don’t fancy the Sharks have the skillset to trouble Sydney’s D. We’re giving the Roosters a good shot for 13+.
  • The Tigers meanwhile, might be the most underrated offense in the league right now. They’ve quietly averaged over 4 line breaks and 16 points per game, while facing the defenses ranked 3rd, 4th, 6th and 7th. That sort of productivity should have people starting to take them seriously, but nobody’s noticed because of all the losing. That may be about to change with a run of winnable games against North Queensland, Manly and St George-Illawarra on the horizon. After four weeks of tough sledding against elite defenses they’ll be thrilled to run into the league’s worst defense here, and we can see them blowing the doors off. If Wests get going, we doubt the Cowboys can keep up.
  • Finally, we get to two of the real pleasant surprises of 2021, the Eels and the Dragons. We weren’t really believers in Parramatta coming into the season, but through four weeks, their metre-eating has been unlike anything we’ve seen before. The Eels’ RMVOA is an absurd 15.77% – a number so huge that it represents almost an extra 200m compared to the 2nd-best team in the league. They start their sets magnificently with both Clint Gutherson and Maika Sivo averaging over 10m-per-carry, their starting pack keeps their sets rolling with 9m+  from Reagan Campbell-Gillard and Shaun Lane, and their bench rotation then kicks them up a gear with Ray Stone, Oregon Kaufusi and Isaiah Papali’i all going for over 10m a tote. There’s no respite for opposition defenses, and as a result they’ve made over 1400m in every match so far, including against the league’s best run defense (the Storm), in a game where they only had 46% possession! The Dragons certainly try hard, but it’s hard to see them slowing down the Parramatta juggernaut, especially when they’ve conceded over 1400m in every game so far – a group that includes 2 of the bottom 3 teams in RMVOA. We’re expecting Parra to rumble downfield with very little resistance, and that they’ll eventually run up the score through sheer weight of pressure. Again, 13+ is a fair chance.
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NRL Tips – Week 4, 2021

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2021 Season Results:

Head-to-Head Tipping: 18/24 (75%) (Last week: 5/8)

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%

(NOTE: If this is your first visit to the site, be sure to click here for an explanation of what we’re all about.)

  • Panthers
  • Rabbitohs
  • Storm
  • Sharks
  • Raiders
  • Knights
  • Roosters
  • Eels

Notes

  • If you’ve been feeling bad for the Sea Eagles that they’ve had to get through the early stages of the season without their first-choice fullback (Tom Trbojevic; amateur foot-race) and hooker (Manase Fainu; unusually hectic blue-light disco), you can settle in for Thursday night’s clash comfortable that both sides have been equally disadvantaged. Here, Manly will be meeting a Panthers side who are also missing their preferred 1 & 9 (coincidentally both through broken bones below the elbow). Does that mean that Manly should suddenly be competitive? Probably not. In part, this is because the Panthers have significantly better alternative options than the Sea Eagles (we suspect the Panthers’ replacements Matt Burton and Mitch Kenny would both be automatic selections in Manly’s Top 17 if they happened to play on the Northern Beaches), but also because even if both offenses were equally clunky (they’re not), we’d still expect Penrith to get home on the back of their league-leading defense. The numbers on the defensive side of the ball are so lop-sided it’s mind-blowing. The Panthers (1st in Defense VOA) have conceded just 10 points all season. Manly (3rd last in Defense VOA), meanwhile, have conceded over 36… per game. If we were to highlight any one particular cause of this disparity (and, let’s be honest – there are plenty to choose from), it’s Manly’s total inability to prevent line breaks. They have the 2nd worst LBCVOA in the NRL (32.62%), which has been ‘achieved’ by allowing an obscene 7.3 breaks per game. These have come overwhelmingly on their right edge, where Jason Saab (8 line breaks conceded), Moses Suli (5) and Daly Cherry-Evans (5) have been about as water-tight as a tea-strainer. This week, they’ll get to face perhaps the league’s best attacking left edge. Missed tackle aficionados will particularly want to keep an eye out for Saab (42% tackle efficiency, worst in the entire league) as he attempts to defend Brian To’o (21 tackle breaks, 1st in the entire league), in what shapes as a mismatch comparable to that of David vs Goliath (if instead of being a terrifying Philistine giant, Goliath had instead been a 5’8″ Samoan man with the voice of Luther Vandross).
  • Having now gone 2 consecutive games without registering a point, Trent Barrett has decided to shake things up, moving Queensland Origin fullback Corey Allan to the wing for Nick Meaney(?!), and dropping Jake Averillo altogether to make room for the return of Lachlan Lewis. To be fair, we weren’t going to be picking the Bulldogs anyway, and we can understand Barrett’s desire to shake things up, but these moves (Allan in particular) just scream of desperation. Yes, their spine has been ineffective, but it won’t matter who they trot out until they find a way of competing for yardage. Through three weeks, they’ve been out-gained by at least 289m each week. They’ve conceded over 1700m in back-to-back starts, and just get run over by absolutely everybody. If you’re spending each game working your way out of your end and running into set defensive lines, it simply doesn’t matter who your spine is (just ask Manly, and their highly-regarded but equally ineffective halves, Daly Cherry-Evans and Kieran Foran). As a team that struggles for go-forward, the quickest shortcut to reducing time spent working it out of their own end would be to try not to start there in the first place. That means improving their discipline, in particular their league-worst 9.7 total penalties conceded per game. This ill-discipline is forcing the side to defend extra sets, costing them time-in-possession, field position and fatigue. From there, their bog-average forwards struggle to do much of anything (they have four regular forwards averaging 7-metres-or-less per game). They should theoretically have a better chance than usual to approach a 50% possession share this week against a Rabbitohs side making the most errors of any side in the game (over 14). But even if they do, who do they have to try and capitalise on this uptick in opportunities? Lachlan freaking Lewis. Good grief.
  • We tipped that an offensive breakout may have been coming last week for the Broncos, and they (eventually) obliged, pouring 24 unanswered points on the hapless Bulldogs. This week, though, they face a difficult second act. They’ve got next to no chance of winning (or seriously competing) in this contest – their mediocre defense will see to that – but we’re very much interested in seeing how their offense goes against the brilliant Storm defense. The Broncos play an offload-happy style of offense – something that Melbourne have traditionally struggled with – and have been showing an ability to attack from any area of the field. They’ve been rolling along quite well offensively, but it should be noted that Parramatta are the only high-end defense they’ve faced so far. If they can put a few points past Melbourne, people will have to start taking Brisbane seriously, regardless of the actual outcome of the match.
  • Try not to focus too much on the eventual 28-4 scoreline last weekend for the Sharks, and instead remember the fact that they played the last 43 minutes with the only 13 players they had left. When Will Kennedy left the field shortly before halftime, they were in it up to their eyeballs, trailing Parramatta just 10-4. When you consider the fact that they were unable to rotate players the rest of the way, we think it’s actually impressive that they hung on as well as they did, not conceding another try until the 69th minute (at which point the dam wall broke). That performance gave us a lot of hope that the Sharkies can start putting something together going forward. The Cowboys, on the other hand, continued to embarrass themselves, getting smoked 44-8 by the Gold Coast.
  • At this point, we need to provide a disclaimer: our own model actually projects the Titans to win their clash with the Raiders this weekend (by approximately half a try). We’re not, however, tipping them. The reason for this is that the Raiders’ defensive numbers have been majorly skewed by New Zealand’s big second half performance last Saturday – an effort that we don’t believe is an accurate reflection of Canberra’s D. The issue here (as with the Sharks’ game above) is that a swag of early injuries that saw Canberra lose Joe Tapine, Ryan James and Sebastian Kris within the opening 12 minutes forced Canberra to play for over an hour with just a single man on the bench, and Curtis Scott to play out the match with broken ribs. Under these circumstances, it should come as no surprise that Canberra got hammered in the second half – and that’s exactly what transpired. Up until half-time, the Raiders had missed just 11 tackles and conceded 3 line breaks. In the second stanza, they gave up 25 and 7. Perhaps the most glaring difference was in offloads, with the Warriors making just 3 in the first half, compared to a whopping 16 in the second (which reflects both the fatigue of the Raiders and their inability to wrap up the ball, as well as the mentality of the Warriors in trying to run down a big lead). The difference here is chalk and cheese, and Canberra’s second half was clearly out of character with their defensive efforts through the opening fortnight. Through two weeks, Canberra’s LBCVOA was -43.94% (1st in the league); in Round 3, it was 119.13%. And if we apply our model without including that outing, we find it projecting Canberra as the winner (again, by about half a try). The match certainly looks to be competitive, so we don’t hate anyone who fancies the Titans (and we’d probably agree that at $2.45 they’re a great price), but we’re expecting Canberra to look more like the Green Machine we’re accustomed to this weekend.
  • As with the Broncos, the Dragons have been another pleasant surprise so far in 2021, having successfully turned a soft early-season schedule into 2 wins and 5th spot on the NRL ladder. Accordingly, they deserve genuine consideration here in a meeting with a Knights side who looked extremely disappointing while going down to the Tigpies. Defensively, there’s not a lot between these two teams, with St George-Illawarra prone to missing a lot of tackles and giving up a lot of yards, while keeping their line relatively tight. The Knights, meanwhile, do the opposite (they’ve given up the NRL’s 4th worst LBCVOA, but have missed no more than 25 tackles in a match; the Dragons have missed no fewer than 27, and average 33). For their part, the Knights appear set to address this somewhat, with Blake Green named to return via the bench. Bringing him on would allow Newcastle to slide Kurt Mann into centre and remove Gehamat Shibasaki (who was clearly the weakest link last weekend, making 3 errors and conceding 2 line breaks and a try) altogether. With both defenses roughly average, we’d expect this game to be settled on the offensive side of the ball – and this is where we give the edge to Newcastle. Not only do the Knights possess the superior LBVOA and RMVOA, but the Dragons are also now without their halfback, Ben Hunt. While we’re aware that Hunt has been something of a meme in recent seasons, we can’t ignore just how good he’s actually been to open the season – he ranks 1st in the NRL for line break assists, 2nd for try assists and 4th for try involvements. With the Dragons being a little worse than Newcastle as it was, you’d have to think that any drop-off through switching from Hunt to Adam Clune would be enough to put this out of reach.
  • After tipping that the Warriors were a great value play last weekend while over $4, we’re feeling the opposite here, with them coming all the way in to $2.60 against the Roosters. The current price looks to us like an over-correction, made as a result of the Warriors’ upset win over Canberra, as well as Sydney’s loss of Luke Keary and Lachlam Lam. On the first point, we’ll remind you (again) that the Raiders were forced to play out the final hour with a one-man bench. In that context, it shouldn’t be considered terribly impressive that New Zealand were able to mount a comeback – it was almost inevitable. Indeed, we’re actually more concerned by what happened while the Raiders were still relatively fresh – they ran up a 25-6 halftime lead. As pleasing as it was to see New Zealand punish an opponent that was clearly on the ropes, it would be unrealistic to expect a repeat performance against a Roosters side who will be almost certainly fresher, and whose defense is significantly better than Canberra’s in the first place (3rd v 8th). Secondly, with regards to buying into the loss of Luke Keary, that shapes as a case of “buyer beware”. As good as Keary is, he’s not the be-all and end-all for Sydney. In 2020 he missed two games (against Brisbane and Wests) and was replaced by Drew Hutchison – who will again come into the side here – and the Roosters won both those outings, by a combined score of 96-28. The Panthers showed last week that the league’s best sides can still win without their studs, as Matt Burton turned in a man-of-the-match performance en route to beating the Storm. Well, the Roosters have an elite young half of their own in the form of Sam Walker, who’ll be coming in for Lam. Given the total mismatch of quality in the surrounding players and the fact that New Zealand are quietly without their best half as well (Chanel Harris-Tevita), we find it baffling that the Warriors are being as warmly supported as they are. We strongly prefer the Roosters, and consider $1.50 great value.
  • Similarly, we’re not terribly interested in the Tigers, despite their upset win against Newcastle last Sunday. Ignoring the scoreline, the Tigers looked bog average and needed the game to be presented to them on a platter  (and even then struggled to ice the game). Newcastle made a disgraceful 18 errors – the sort of number that should have seen them blown off the park. Instead, the game went down to the wire, as Wests’ “defense” did their absolute darnedest to blow it. We don’t expect them to get the same sort of gifts from the Eels, and without them, they may not see the other side of halfway at all. Parra’s yardage has been unbelievable this season, ranking a distant 1st in RMVOA. The Eels have run for over 1700m (a mark the Tigers haven’t gotten within 250m of) twice in three weeks, courtesy of huge numbers from their back three and a mid-career resurgence from Reagan Campbell-Gillard, who ranks 6th among NRL forwards for runs of over 8m, and 4th for total yardage. Armed with favourable field position and the league’s 4th best defense, we’d expect Parra to comfortably contain the Tigers’ offense, and we know that in recent times they’ve had no trouble whatsoever running up a score in this matchup (Parra have scored 20+ in 7 of their last 8 against the Tigers). We’re taking the Eels with confidence.
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NRL Tips – Week 3, 2021

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2021 Season Results:

Head-to-Head Tipping: 13/16 (81%) (Last week: 6/8)

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%

(NOTE: If this is your first visit to the site, be sure to click here for an explanation of what we’re all about.)

  • Panthers
  • Dragons
  • Roosters
  • Raiders
  • Broncos
  • Eels
  • Knights
  • Titans

Notes

  • Week 3 kicks off with a Grand Final rematch between the Panthers and the Storm, and we don’t mind the Panthers’ shot at sweet redemption. Speaking broadly, the Storm actually aren’t a bad match-up for Penrith – indeed, the Panthers turned in the worst 70 minutes of football imaginable in last year’s decider and still somehow finished up tied at 4 tries a piece. The Storm’s strength is hands-down their defense, but with the Panthers still yet to concede a point in 2021, there’s an argument that that the Panthers are actually better in that regard (especially with the Storm conceding an unusually high 3 tries-per-game over the opening fortnight). Like the Storm, Penrith like to muscle up and dominate through the middle of the field, and here they’ll get a shot at a Melbourne pack missing key men Dale Finucane and Felise Kaufusi, with Nelson Asofa-Solomona also under a cloud. They’ll like their chances of dominating field position, which should lead to a greater share of attacking opportunities. Yes, their attack is will be impacted by the absences of Nathan Cleary and Api Koroisau, but let’s be clear: the Storm are without Harry Grant and Ryan Papenhauzen themselves, and since their season-opening 20-minute blitzkrieg against South Sydney they actually haven’t been particularly dangerous (in their past 120 minutes of football, they’ve scored just 2 tries and 16 points). The loss of Cleary will sting, but this was never likely to be a high-scoring affair – if you’re backing the Panthers, you’re backing their all-World defense to get them home. After having a whole summer to stew over their Grand Final loss, we fully expect them to be up for this in front of their home crowd – Cleary or not.
  • After originally fancying that we wouldn’t be picking the Dragons all year, we’ve been forced to change our tune relatively quickly. St George-Illawarra certainly haven’t been impressive per se, but they have at least been competitive – something that can’t be said of the Sea Eagles. Through two weeks, Manly’s D has been absolutely shredded, conceding a whopping 17 line breaks, while the unsexy Dragons have allowed… 4. Total. Granted, the Sea Eagles have also played two of the best offenses in football, but those sorts of numbers are nonetheless totally unacceptable. Des Hasler teams are notoriously ordinary in attack and depend on their defenses to be competitive; but with their struggling offense hampered by the continued absence of Tom Trbojevic and their pathetic forward pack seeing them outgained by 699m over two weeks, their D needs to be really good to put them in with any sort of chance to compete in matches. And so far in 2021, it’s fair to say that they haven’t been.
  • Friday night’s second game pits the aforementioned best offenses in the league against one another, in what should be must-watch television for try-scoring enthusiasts. The Roosters have been in superb touch so far in 2021, scoring a league-high 86 points (an incredible 34 more points than the 2nd-ranked teams, Penrith and Newcastle; meanwhile five different teams have yet to score 34 points, total). Here, they’ll be adding Victor Radley and Angus Crichton to the side that hammered Wests last weekend, in a gamewhere they punished the Tigers for an ill-disciplined 13 error effort. In the Rabbitohs, they get an opponent who’ve made the most errors in the competition through two weeks, including 15 last weekend against Manly. The Rabbitohs will need to quickly clean that up if they’re to make this game competitive, and even then, you’d have to think they’ll be overpowered by a Sydney side hoping to avenge their embarrassing 60-8 loss from their previous meeting. We like Sydney, and could see them doing it comfortably if they get going.
  • The price on the Warriors looks quite enticing for Saturday afternoon’s encounter with the Raiders ($4.25 at time of writing). New Zealand are a team with some pretty severe attacking limitations and are now without halfback Chanel Harris-Tevita, but they’ve been defensively sound through the opening weeks, and last week proved that they can hang with a Top 8-quality side. The Raiders, meanwhile, were slugging away in an ugly race-to-the-bottom with Cronulla. After having the game well in control at half-time, the Raiders turned in one of their worst halves of football in recent memory, inviting Cronulla back into the match with a woeful 53% completion rate, that saw them limited to a meagre 37% second-half possession share. With that context, it’s almost miraculous that they were still able to find a way to win (even if that way was just “stand in the in-goal and watch Chad Townsend”). We don’t expect Canberra to be anywhere near as bad again here, and are tipping them accordingly. But, if they were to replicate that performance, the Warriors have shown themselves to be good enough to compete – which makes their price a little enticing.
  • It’s generally difficult to find much positive to write about a side in the middle of a club-record losing streak, but let’s throw them a bone: the Broncos’ offense actually isn’t looking that bad. Despite being soundly beaten in back-to-back starts (and if you include last season, back-to-back-to-back…) their issues so far have been almost exclusively on the defensive side of the ball; with the footy in hand, they actually look alright. They rank 6th in the league for LBVOA, and 5th for RMVOA – numbers that compare favourably to the Bulldogs’ 11th and last. If anything, their offensive improvement is being somewhat hidden by their relative lack of tries. Their try-to-LB ratio is the 3rd-lowest in the league, and we’d expect that to positively regress with time. Should their current line break rate keep up – and against a Canterbury side conceding 7 breaks per game through 2 rounds, there’s little reason to think it won’t – at some point we’d expect tries to follow. They may very well arrive this week, and we’re tipping a long-awaited win for the Brisbane faithful – potentially by 13+.
  • Credit where it’s due – we gave the Eels next to no chance of snatching a win last weekend, and they made us look like fools. But before you start clearing space in Parramatta’s trophy cabinet (a process that admittedly won’t take long), enjoy a quick reality check: yes, the Eels finished ahead of Melbourne on the scoreboard. They were also outgained by 293m, missed more tackles, made fewer line breaks, and conceded more drop-outs. On any other day, Parramatta lose that game with that sort of output. It speaks volumes of the side’s character that they kept turning up time and again to turn away the Storm’s offensive onslaught, but we’re still unconvinced that they have the credentials to compete with the top sides in September. This week, however, they’ll be playing a mediocre side in March, so we suppose they should be fine.
  • We mentioned above that the Broncos possess the league’s 3rd-lowest try-to-LB ratio. The team with the lowest? The Tigers. As with Brisbane, we’d expect that ratio to adjust with time, and it makes us a bit tentative to endorse the Knights too strongly. The Tigers have so far looked like a vastly improved side from their 2020 model at times; their problem is that at the first sign of adversity, they immediately indulge in a Nick Kyrgios-style tank. Through their first two games, the Tigers have lost their first halves by just a combined 24-12. In their second halves, however – once the game has started getting away from them – they’ve been belted 46-6. If they can find a way to get into a lead – and they have shown an ability to split defensive lines – it’d be interesting to see if it leads to a better effort deep into matches. We can’t tip them head-to-head until they’ve actually shown us something, but as with the Warriors game, we could definitely be tempted here at the right price.
  • We feel like at some point, the Cowboys are going to put it all together and blow somebody off the park. Their backline is stacked with talent, they’ve got speed to burn… on paper, they just look exciting. On grass though, they’re an eyesore. After having spent too many years shackled by Paul Green’s 5-hit-ups-and-a-kick “attacking structure”, we expected them to be big improvers in 2021. Boy, were we wrong. Instead, they look completely rudderless, with no clear direction or attacking strategy. In one set, Scott Drinkwater will be the main man, touching the ball nearly every play. The next, he’ll vanish, and it’ll be Michael Morgan or Jake Clifford doing something completely different (and inevitably, ineffective). Their complete lack of direction was laid bare for all to see last Saturday night, as they managed to turn a second half 55% possession share and 74% territorial advantage into a measly 12 points. A visiting Titans side missing halfback Ash Taylor should be ripe for the picking, but we just can’t bring ourselves to get on board. We’re only a couple of weeks in, but the Cowboys have easily been our biggest disappointments so far.
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NRL Tips – Week 2, 2021

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2021 Season Results:

Head-to-Head Tipping: 7/8 (88%)

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%

(NOTE: If this is your first visit to the site, be sure to click here for an explanation of what we’re all about.)

  • Storm
  • Knights
  • Titans
  • Panthers
  • Rabbitohs
  • Cowboys
  • Roosters
  • Raiders

Notes

  • Whatever doubts we may have had about the Storm offense without Cameron Smith were swiftly put to bed during a first half barrage, in which Melbourne put a whopping 6 line breaks past the South Sydney D. The Storm looked fit, fast and in mid-season form as they blew the Bunnies off the park. Importantly, their defense also picked up exactly where they left off, recording the league’s best RMCVOA of the opening round (-14.59%). Similarly, the Eels also picked up exactly where they left off in 2020; unfortunately, that was playing the kind of miserable football that led to them being bundled out of the playoffs in straight sets. Parramatta’s 2020 ended with the Eels conceding 98 points over their last 3 games, and after watching them get gashed for 6 line breaks by Brisbane (a mark the Broncos hit just twice all last season), it appears that little has changed. We’ll be shocked if they keep Melbourne under 20.
  • Let us preface our next spiel with this: we believe the Warriors have the capacity to make the finals this year. Their impressive handling seems to have carried over from last season (they made the fewest errors of Round 1, including just a single second half error as they strangled the Gold Coast out of the game), and with a suddenly-decent forward pack led by Addin Fonua-Blake (who ran for over 180m at almost 10 metres-per-carry), they should be able to earn the field position they need to support a dour, defense-oriented strategy. All of that being said, we’re not sure we love this match-up for them. Our major concern with New Zealand is their offense. In the modern game, it’s become customary for teams to feature a ball-player at either fullback or hooker to provide an extra attacking option for defenses to account for – if you have a running fullback like Dylan Edwards, say, you pair him with a playmaking hooker like Api Koroisau; if you have a running hooker like Damien Cook, you add a playmaking fullback like Latrell Mitchell. The Warriors, however, have opted for blokes who are primarily runners in both slots (Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Wayde Egan). Last year, this duo combined for just 7 try assists between them, and they failed to contribute any form of assist against the Titans. This has the consequence of making the Warriors incredibly predictable to defend, limiting their ability to generate line breaks, and by extension, tries (last season, they were held to 3 tries or fewer in 65% of their matches). Without the ability to create much in the way of points, their path to victories becomes somewhat limited, and we’d expect them to struggle against any of the league’s top offenses. The question this week, though is: are the Knights (without Kalyn Ponga) such an offense? Newcastle certainly looked good enough against Canterbury, posting 32 points and 7 line breaks, and as a result we’re giving them the benefit of the doubt. We’re expecting the Warriors to make them work for it, though, and heavy rain would likely suit New Zealand. We’re backing the Knights, but with very little conviction.
  • A common talking point from Round 1 was “how good the Broncos looked”. Assuming that this viewpoint isn’t just the mainstream media defending their guy after successfully chasing Anthony Seibold out of town, we think this viewpoint warrants some examination. Did they look better? Certainly. Were they good? Ehhh… In our view, the “impressiveness” of Brisbane’s performance seems to be predicated on the belief that Parramatta are a Top 4-quality team – a belief The Obstruction Rule firmly rejects. It seems reasonably obvious to us that Melbourne, Sydney, Penrith, Canberra and Souths are all in a tier above Parramatta, leaving the Eels in the cluster of sides competing for the slots between 6-12 – like the Tigers, for example. Now let us ask you this: if Brisbane eked out a 16-point lead courtesy of a 60% first half possession share before getting run down by the Tigers, would you be impressed? That’s what we thought.
  • As for the Titans, they need to get a whole lot better, and fast. Their 16 handling errors left them with no shot against New Zealand, but the real disappointment was the total ineffectiveness of their much-hyped left edge. Having invested in David Fifita, they understandably aimed to use him, but he was largely just a battering ram. The Titans’ shape on the left edge was surprisingly vanilla, and failed to create much indecision at all for New Zealand’s edge defenders (outside of an electric play that sprung Corey Thompson downfield from his own in-goal). Coach Justin Holbrook would do well to go away and look and tapes of Viliame Kikau and the 2020 Panthers, to see how to more effectively utilise a strike second-rower (we wouldn’t recommend watching tape of Penrith’s left edge from last week though, unless he wishes to view a lowlight package of mistakes and bombed tries). They’ll be better for the run, and their handling will certainly improve (it can’t get any worse). Thankfully they’ve got the Broncos’ defense here to play them into a bit of form.
  • We warned Bulldogs fans last week that their upgraded offense would mean little without any meaningful improvement to their forward pack, and it came to fruition in a first-up loss to Newcastle. While it was pleasing to see Trent Barrett’s touch immediately improve his side’s offense, generating 5 line breaks (a number they hit just 4 times all season a year ago), the result was all too familiar – a loss by 13+. Canterbury were outgained by almost 300m, with Ofahiki Ogden their only forward to hit the 100m mark (for comparison, 4 of the Knights’ starting forwards got to 140m). It matters little how slick your attacking moves are if you’re only ever executing them on your own side of halfway. This week they face similarly bleak prospects against a Panthers group who just outgained the Cowboys by over 500m. It doesn’t bode well.
  • After having their left edge annihilated by the Roosters, it’s no surprise that the Sea Eagles have made a change, swapping out Jack Gosiewski for Andrew Davey. The second rower is perhaps the most critical defender in Des Hasler’s defensive structure, and Gosiewski was found severely lacking in both mobility and decision-making. Whether or not Davey is an upgrade remains to be seen, but they can’t go any worse.
  • The Cowboys and Dragons game may be the most difficult match of the round to pick. The Cowboys were objectively awful against Penrith, making a disgraceful 18 errors and failing to register a point against the defending minor premiers. As for the Dragons, they were competitive through the first hour, before fading late. At a glance, it seems like St George-Illawarra were the better performers, but on closer inspection, we’re not so sure. Though the Dragons managed to scoop up 18 points, their offensive output wasn’t significantly better than North Queensland’s – they were both error-riddled (16 errors for Saints vs 18 for the Cows), they both made just 2 line breaks, and they both struggled mightily for yardage (1272m for the Dragons, vs 1106m for the Cowboys). However, the Cowboys were facing arguably the best defense of 2020; the Dragons were facing one of the worst. Consequently, we fancy the Cowboys are better placed for an improvement in output this week in their return to Townsville.
  • Any misconceptions that the Tigers have significantly improved over the off-season were quickly terminated during their 30-12 whooping from Canberra. Though they showed some positive signs – their 4 forced drop-outs were equal to 15% of their total from the entire 2020 season, for example – they nonetheless appear to be a long way away from the top echelon of sides. Despite benefiting from an unusually sloppy display from the Raiders (who made 15 errors) and a league-high 7 set-restart penalties, they got very little offensive traction, producing just 2 tries and 3 line breaks. Further, after having ended 2020 being held to under 1300m in 4 of their final 5 matches, they again struggled for go-forward, managing just 1272m (the 5th-lowest total of the round, and the lowest of any team with a 50% or greater possession share). Under the circumstances, this makes the decision to bump Russell Packer from the bench (who gobbled up over 11m-per-tote in limited minutes) for Moses Mbye somewhat curious, though given his brief usage he’s clearly on the nose. Still, opting for a bench composition featuring two outside backs is odd, especially for a date with one of the nastier packs in the NRL (the Roosters gained a league-high 1779m in their rout of the Sea Eagles, with six of their forwards gaining 88m or more – double that of the Tigers’ engine room). Perhaps Madge’s plan is to beat them with speed; perhaps it’s to make a late change and use a more conventional interchange strategy. Either way, they’re likely going to lose.
  • The Sharks struggled to get past a pretty ordinary Dragons outfit on Sunday night, and the final scoreline masked what was a fairly insipid display. Though Cronulla finished with 5 tries, it should be noted that they produced just 2 line breaks. To highlight how fluky their try tally was, consider this: on the weekend only 3 other teams (Manly, North Queensland and St George-Illawarra) were held to 2 line breaks or fewer… and Cronulla scored more points than those three teams combined (30 vs 22). Put simply, if they continue to struggle to create opportunities – and that is certainly likely, with a very handy Raiders defense coming up – you can expect their points total to drop considerably. And against a Canberra side who scored 20+ on 14 separate occasions last year, that’s a bad omen.
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NRL Tips – Week 1, 2021

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  • 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%

(NOTE: If this is your first visit to the site, be sure to click here for an explanation of what we’re all about.)

  • Storm
  • Knights
  • Eels
  • Titans
  • Roosters
  • Panthers
  • Raiders
  • Sharks

Notes

  • There’s a groundswell of support for the Rabbitohs to start the season with a bang, but don’t count The Obstruction Rule among those backing the Bunnies. South Sydney are a good side, yes, but unless Wayne Bennett has dramatically altered their attacking structure in the off-season, they’re simply not built to beat the Storm. Or issue lies with their dependence on quick play-the-balls and forward dominance – two things teams rarely get against the Storm – to generate any sort of attack. Melbourne have been a distant 1st in RMCVOA for almost as long as we can remember, and the off-season loss of Cameron Smith won’t change that. We fully expect the Storm to control the ruck, and in so doing to take Damien Cook out of the game. From there, Souths will be forced to resort to repetitive 2nd man plays targeting Melbourne’s edges – a tactic that Melbourne easily snuff out with a set line and aggressive reloading cover defense. The Storm strangled Souths out of the game in both meetings last year (Souths mustered a combined 3 tries in two matches against Melbourne), and we’d expect them to be similarly held in check here. If they can exhaust Latrell Mitchell with an effective kicking game, Melbourne should feel confident they can limit the Bunnies’ offensive effectiveness. The bigger question though, is what does Melbourne’s offense look like sans Smith? Here we feel much less confident, and you’d have to expect a decline from their 2nd ranked offense in 2020. They’ve made some smart, low-key off-season additions (George Jennings could be an absolute monster in their offense), but Smith leaves big shoes to fill. For this reason, we do expect it to be close, but we favour Melbourne to get it done with their D.
  • The Bulldogs come into 2021 with a sense of optimism following a heap of player turnover from their scrub squad of the past few years. Origin reps Nic Cotric and Corey Allan give their back-line some real star power, while the arrival of Kyle Flanagan is a HUGE upgrade over anything they’ve had in the halves over the past few years. Trent Barrett is an offensive mastermind, giving real hope to the possibility that they may finally pull away from their spot as the worst offense in the NRL. Are they suddenly a good team, though? Probably not. Sure, their offense stunk, but that was only the tip of an iceberg of problems for their squad. Perhaps an even bigger issue for them is the total ineptitude of their forward pack – a problem they’ve done very little to solve. Their major additions were Jack Hetherington (a stud… when he isn’t suspended) and Corey Waddell, who would barely move the needle (even if the needle was caught flat-footed and looking in a different direction). And without the ability to earn any sort of field position, the absolute best the Bulldogs could hope for would be to resemble something like the 2019 Knights – a brilliant red zone offense who still missed the playoffs because they rarely got into the red zone. As it happens, the Knights learnt that lesson and have since developed a handy forward group, further bolstered this year by the additions of Tyson Frizell and Suaso Sue. We expect Newcastle to look a bit clunky without Kalyn Ponga, but that shouldn’t matter given the potential field position mismatch.
  • Oh my goodness – what even is this Broncos team? They lost their biggest star, David Fifita, to their cross-town rivals over the summer, and come in here missing their two best remaining players (Payne Haas and Kotoni Staggs) to injury. As a result, the team they’re trotting out here is just gross, and has them well placed to extend their club-record 11-game losing streak.
  • The Warriors-Titans clash on Saturday arvo has the potential to be a sneaky underdog for game of the round. The story of the summer has obviously been the Gold Coast’s rapid transition from ‘pretender’ to ‘contender’, given their hot finish to 2020 and the big-money additions of young stars David Fifita and Tino Fa’asuamaleaui. Many scoffed (your author included) when they chose to sink more money into their backrow, having already whiffed on importing Kevin Proctor (who has been decent enough, but has never replicated his form from Melbourne, nor has his arrival brought any kind of success). But after coach Justin Holbrook somehow unlocked Ash Taylor and the Titans’ offense, suddenly the new additions look like having the potential to thrust the Titans into the finals. That being said, the Warriors are no joke themselves. Sure, they eventually quit on the season over the final month of 2020, but before that they managed to jag 4 wins in 5 games to put themselves within touching distance of the unlikeliest finals berth, despite a hodge-podge squad dependent on borrowing other teams’ cast-offs. Now, they suddenly get to drop arguably the game’s best prop (Addin Fonua-Blake) into a forward pack further bolstered by the additions of Ben Murdoch-Masila and Bayley Sironen, and the return of Leeson Ah Mau. The Warriors are no joke, and we honestly wouldn’t be surprised if they can get an upset here. Whatever happens, we can’t wait to watch it.
  • One team’s gain is another’s loss, and sadly the Sea Eagles now have to get used to life without Fonua-Blake. If you think his loss isn’t a big deal, we’d like to point out that over the past two seasons, Manly have won just 2 games from 9 without their star big man, with over half those losses coming against sides who ultimately missed the finals. The issue, of course, is that the rest of their pack has been consistently terrible. Oh, and they’re also missing mega-stud Tom Trbojevic for the opening few weeks. Pass.
  • Of course we’ll be tipping the defending Minor Premiers, the Panthers on Saturday night – they were far and away the best side for much of 2020, and their squad has suffered minimal turnover – but we’re keen to see what the Cowboys produce. Todd Payten did a stellar job after taking over the Warriors mid-season, and we’ve long argued that North Queensland’s biggest issue has been coaching more so than cattle. Indeed, their squad actually looks pretty exciting on paper, with Payten finding a way to squeeze attacking weapons Scott Drinkwater, Kyle Feldt, Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow and Valentine Holmes all into the same backline (and Esan Marsters is in there, too). The Panthers are deserving favourites, but we’re not sleeping on North Queensland this year. It may not start this week, but don’t be shocked if they’re even sitting comfortably within the Top 8 in six weeks time.
  • The Tigers looked like world-beaters as they ran all over Manly in their trial a fortnight ago, but the leap in class here is likely to take the air right out of their balloon. Thumping the Tigers is such a long-standing tradition in Canberra that it should come with a public holiday. They’ve won 9 of their last 11 against Wests, and scored 20+ in all but 2 of those matches. They get back star hooker Josh Hodgson, and will be parachuting Ryan James into what was already a formidable pack. Canberra by a few.
  • If the Dragons were an American sports team, you’d be certain that they’re tanking for a high draft pick. It’s almost unfathomable that a team who won just 7 games last year has gotten worse, but it sure looks like it. They somehow managed to replace Paul McGregor with an even less inspiring leader in Anthony “Mumbles” Griffin, who promptly chased captain Cameron McInnes out of the club to make way for the pedestrian Andrew McCullough. Gone are the club’s few decent players – McInnes, Tyson Frizell, Korbin Sims and Euan Aitken – and in comes… Jack Bird and Daniel Alvaro? There’s very little for Dragons fans to get excited about, and their squad is so far below standard that we’re not hesitating to tip a Sharks side missing a host of stars, like Shaun Johnson, Siosifa Talakai and Royce Hunt. To be frank, the only thing we’d pick St George for is the spoon.
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