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Episode 141: In League With the NRL 2022: Season Preview · Death by Multimedia

• 0:01
  Can I there and welcome to a brand new season of in League
• 0:05
  with the NRL? It's 2022.
• 0:08
  And hopefully we put covid to bed and we can have a season
• 0:12
  where there are as few interruptions as possible on
• 0:15
  today's first episode. I'll give you my exclusive
• 0:18
  preview of where all of the teams are going to finish in
• 0:22
  2022 which gives you the jump start to get onto your bookie
• 0:27
  and bet on exactly the opposite of what I'm Say, so let's not
• 0:32
  waste any time. Let's get started with the 20 22
• 0:35
  edition of in League with the n r l--.
• 1:24
  Well, this is could be a really short episode given that if you
• 1:30
  look at the ladder from last year, I don't think it's going
• 1:34
  to change too much when it comes to this year.
• 1:37
  Now there are some teams that are going to go up and others
• 1:40
  that are going to fall down but I don't know that the top of the
• 1:45
  ladder is really going to change that much.
• 1:48
  In fact, there's probably only one team that can really
• 1:51
  Challenge from outside the bottom a lot.
• 1:53
  Last year to move up. Anywhere near that top four.
• 1:59
  So The Boeing in the offseason was interesting in that a couple
• 2:06
  of teams really went out there and threw themselves on the
• 2:09
  line, and a lot of others just left themselves and did nothing
• 2:13
  and just thought will hold on to what we've got as best they can.
• 2:17
  So I think personally we know that that last year so we can
• 2:22
  look at the Bulldogs and the Bulldogs finished last last
• 2:24
  year. They had three wins out of their
• 2:27
  entire season now. But they have really gone in big
• 2:31
  when it comes to buying up plays for this season.
• 2:35
  And for next season 2, when they finally come on board and Is
• 2:41
  interesting given that obviously Matt Burton is there is a number
• 2:45
  one signing who had such a great season with the Panthers last
• 2:48
  year and you wonder whether he's regretting leaving the Panthers
• 2:53
  to come to the Bullock's with the Bulldogs aren't going to be
• 2:56
  challenging anytime soon or are they I mean there are people out
• 3:00
  there who think that the Bulldogs are a top 18 this year.
• 3:03
  Now on paper, perhaps that's the case.
• 3:06
  If you look at the team that they've got playing this weekend
• 3:09
  for instance Matt Duffy, who copped a lot of flak at the
• 3:12
  dragons for some reason. But still seem to be able to
• 3:14
  score a hell of a lot of tries Breton Aidan brain Burns.
• 3:19
  Josh Shadow car mat Burton Marshall King is good, Paul
• 3:24
  Vaughn. We all know what happened to him
• 3:26
  with the dragons last year but he's turned up at the Bulldogs
• 3:29
  looking to prove himself to be the penguin jr.
• 3:33
  And then I still got Jack. Hetherington Josh Jackson last
• 3:36
  from last year and Jake Averill. Oh so this squad looks He good.
• 3:41
  But is that going to be enough for them this year?
• 3:44
  And I mean, I've already learned how to play together.
• 3:46
  They've got, they've got a get on with the coach and sometimes
• 3:49
  that seems to be a problem with Trent Barrett, we all know how
• 3:53
  he's three years of being a coach of been to it manly.
• 3:56
  And now one as a head coach at the Bulldogs, they've got a
• 3:59
  really tough year ahead of them. They need to improve and they
• 4:03
  really need to probably getting close to challenging for that
• 4:06
  top eight. Now, I'm not really sure that
• 4:08
  they'll do that but I think they'll Right.
• 4:10
  I'm cells off the bottom. And anyways, much doubt about
• 4:12
  that the Cowboys and the Broncos, a to and let's and
• 4:17
  let's go with the Tigers as well.
• 4:19
  Really, they've all have to improve, but you just can't see
• 4:23
  how they're going to the Cowboys under Todd.
• 4:26
  Peyton didn't have a great year last year, they too have a
• 4:30
  reasonable team on paper, but whether that transfers into
• 4:34
  getting wins is a completely different story, Colville to
• 4:37
  still there. Valentine Holmes is still there.
• 4:40
  Peter hickey who they picked up, Tom did and Chad towns.
• 4:43
  And to be there halves they still got Jason tour Malala
• 4:47
  there, so players are there, but it just didn't seem to work for
• 4:52
  the Cowboys last year. Now, is that a coaching thing
• 4:55
  or, is that a playing thing? Or is it a cultural thing?
• 4:58
  I'm not really sure, but they've got a sub find a way to somehow
• 5:01
  move off the bottom of the table and that also happens for
• 5:05
  Brisbane as well. Now Brisbane, has, we all met at
• 5:06
  a really tough year last year. We're able to offer Offload.
• 5:11
  The Wooden Spoon that they received the year before but
• 5:14
  again with their team. Is it a like the picked up Curt
• 5:19
  capable? Which is a terrific buy and he
• 5:23
  only came on board. Once been I can became the head
• 5:26
  of football. But honestly I mean from a
• 5:31
  personal point of view and I'm not huge on NRL players anymore
• 5:35
  not like the old days when I was a kid.
• 5:36
  Born Anew every play. I don't really know many in the
• 5:38
  names and that Broncos lineup Are they going to improve?
• 5:42
  You'd expect that they'd have more wins this season.
• 5:45
  They're did last year. They had seven wins last year,
• 5:48
  it's not going to get them into the eighth and they don't look
• 5:50
  like they're going to challenge for the eight.
• 5:52
  Tigers are the same Tigers. I don't know.
• 5:55
  Last year, they had plenty of opportunities to win games that
• 5:59
  they then end up losing. It was quite amazing and that
• 6:03
  you look at their season which was eight wins 16 losses, that
• 6:08
  there's probably at least four games are.
• 6:10
  You could say that You could probably change render, they
• 6:12
  should have one and if they go and change that and they become
• 6:16
  12 and 12 will suddenly their top 18.
• 6:20
  Yeah. Is it that simple?
• 6:22
  Some ways? Yes, it is.
• 6:24
  But then to get through that mindset, to be able to say that,
• 6:26
  well, those four games, we should have won.
• 6:28
  If we'd won, can we, can we do that this season?
• 6:31
  I guess, is the, can they turn that around and improve that
• 6:33
  this season initial looking at the trials and you can't take
• 6:38
  crawl for that? It looks still is going to be a
• 6:41
  really, really tough ask for them.
• 6:45
  The Warriors are another team who are in that same basket that
• 6:48
  they tend to play will for a lot of the games and then they just
• 6:52
  let the game slip away in that last 20 minutes.
• 6:55
  I really feel that they're going to struggle again.
• 6:57
  Now this year they're based on the Sunshine Coast rather than
• 7:01
  on the Central Coast of New South Wales.
• 7:04
  The fact that they are into their going to be their third
• 7:07
  season of playing away from New Zealand.
• 7:10
  And not being able to drag teams over there and have to get into
• 7:13
  the plane and get ready to play and play them on their home.
• 7:16
  Ground is another really tough ask for the Warriors this year?
• 7:20
  And you really feel for what might happen because if they
• 7:24
  don't have a season where they can start challenging for the
• 7:29
  top eight this season, then how does that react going forward
• 7:35
  into next season? There's another year.
• 7:37
  Say, well, maybe we'll play at home next year and what if it
• 7:39
  doesn't change? I have userland doesn't change
• 7:41
  and they're still in lockdown, or they have the quarantine laws
• 7:44
  that they currently do, massive for the Warriors, and they've
• 7:48
  been so good for two years to stay where they are doing it for
• 7:52
  a third year. In a row, is going to be really
• 7:53
  tough. And the other team that finished
• 7:57
  down there on that 18 16 points last year was the dragons and we
• 8:01
  all know what happened them at the second half of last season.
• 8:05
  Coach finally got the sack after many years of it thinking, it
• 8:09
  was going to happen. Several players decided to go to
• 8:12
  a covid party and then got suspended, which just completely
• 8:16
  derailed, any chance, the dragon's head of improving on
• 8:20
  last on the previous season. Can I improve this year?
• 8:24
  Well, I've bought a lot of old guys themselves.
• 8:26
  Aaron Woods, Moses. Mm, bye.
• 8:29
  It's an interesting team. They certainly picked for this
• 8:32
  weekend as well. Given that to who would you
• 8:36
  consider their major players have not been picked in the
• 8:39
  squad at all. So I don't know.
• 8:43
  They've got some young blokes coming through.
• 8:46
  They've got some old bloke old heads.
• 8:47
  Come in there and they still got Ben Hunter, who is being paid a
• 8:51
  lot of money to do more than what he's Actually done so far.
• 8:55
  This weekend's game against the Warriors for both teams is is a
• 8:58
  pretty important start to the season.
• 9:02
  So, all of those teams, I don't think you'll see any of those
• 9:04
  six actually fighting for a spot in the top eight.
• 9:08
  I'd be very surprised and probably at least on paper, you
• 9:12
  would think the Bulldogs would be the closest to doing that and
• 9:15
  probably moving up the ladder. Whereas the others are sort of
• 9:19
  still going to be sitting about where they were last season.
• 9:32
  There's 20 seconds on the clock. Elbert people play 21 meters
• 9:37
  away inside Okay, so we've spoken a bit the
• 10:01
  bottom 6 which for me is the same as the bottom 6 of last
• 10:05
  year. I can't see any that Jenny
• 10:07
  changes occurring with that. Watch one of these things jump
• 10:11
  into the box and finish second or third So, let's look at the
• 10:15
  Middlesex and again, I don't think the middle six is going to
• 10:18
  change much from last year. Obviously, the only changes that
• 10:22
  were probably happen. I would expect would be that we
• 10:26
  will have at least two different finalists I would think this
• 10:32
  year. So last year, the knights had a
• 10:36
  season where I think in the long run it was surprising that they
• 10:41
  finished seventh and actually made the semi-finals.
• 10:44
  And then really gave it to the ills to start off that at
• 10:48
  semi-final. But can we see them continue on
• 10:53
  this way? Again, there, another team that
• 10:55
  on paper you would think should have a really good chance of
• 11:00
  playing finals football again. But is that going to be the
• 11:04
  case? I mean they've lost their
• 11:06
  halfback. We hasn't played much the last
• 11:09
  couple of years anyway to be honest.
• 11:11
  Kalin Palmer of course is their main guy that back down the
• 11:14
  back. Jack, I've got centers in Gag.
• 11:16
  I and best to a good Sinners, J Clifford and Adam Clune.
• 11:21
  I get a Workman like sort of half pairing and they've still
• 11:26
  got klemmer. So I Fede Fazil.
• 11:30
  Kurt men. So they've got guys there who
• 11:32
  can do the job and have done the job for many years.
• 11:36
  But is it going to be good enough to get them into finals
• 11:38
  again after last year, they're going to improve on last year
• 11:42
  and the only way they can improve as if pulling a place Is
• 11:44
  every single game and just takes control of every game.
• 11:47
  You would suspect in this, season's going to be hanging
• 11:50
  over the fact that ponga as until June or July to commit to
• 11:55
  the club for next season and until he does that or doesn't do
• 12:00
  that. Then that whole thing is going
• 12:01
  to be hanging over the night. Susan said, it's it's going to
• 12:04
  be tough for them. I think to improve on last year.
• 12:09
  And the other team that finished in the eighth last year, the
• 12:11
  Titans well, they snuck in again, as well as they got in on
• 12:17
  percentage over the Sharks and the Raiders.
• 12:20
  Now, the Titans improved last year and had a terrific, sort of
• 12:25
  season, where they won games of people probably didn't expect
• 12:29
  them to and their problem again is, can they do that this year?
• 12:34
  And can the coach continue to improve this team?
• 12:39
  Now, they've spent big on for feeder and a couple of other
• 12:42
  players, but they haven't really done much apart from that.
• 12:45
  So, are they going to stall? Or are they still going to be
• 12:49
  good enough to find a way to continue to win?
• 12:52
  Games are really one of those. If he teams that you don't
• 12:56
  really see in your mind, being a finals team, but if they play
• 13:00
  their best then they could certainly do that.
• 13:04
  Those two teams biggest problems will be that you can't see the
• 13:08
  Sharks and the Raiders being as bad as they were last year and
• 13:12
  the Raiders just hung in there all year, and still almost made
• 13:17
  finals, even though they just kept losing games, that they
• 13:20
  couldn't possibly lose and found ways to lose it.
• 13:23
  No one could possibly have believed.
• 13:27
  Now, they've lost again, a few players through some
• 13:31
  disgruntlement and all that kind of stuff.
• 13:34
  But they scored together is still very good and Ricky
• 13:38
  Stewart has shown that he can coach teams to finals and two
• 13:43
  grandfathers as he did with the Raiders, a few years ago.
• 13:46
  His main problem has been that once he's made a grand, final
• 13:50
  Hive finals, placing than his team's seem to drop off the
• 13:54
  radar a bit. And that's what happened with
• 13:55
  the Raiders last year. So, the biggest problem for the
• 13:59
  writers for me is, can Ricky turn that around and can he find
• 14:02
  a way to get his team getting forward and going forward and
• 14:06
  finding their way back into finals football and win enough
• 14:09
  games. I mean, this is the thing, the
• 14:11
  Titans made eight spot last year with a record of 10 and 14.
• 14:15
  You shouldn't be playing finals if you're losing more than your
• 14:18
  winning. And yet, that's what happened
• 14:19
  last year. So, hopefully you've just got to
• 14:22
  make sure that you win half your games.
• 14:24
  If you didnt, have the games, you can play finals, and I'm
• 14:26
  sure that's what the Raiders will. be thinking of as a
• 14:28
  minimum, The team you'd expect to jump out of the blocks this
• 14:32
  year, is the sharks. They have a brand new coach
• 14:35
  who's been waiting for his chance to get a first great gig
• 14:38
  for a long time. And he's waited and chosen one
• 14:42
  that he finally wanted to get. And then this weekend, he won't
• 14:46
  even be there because of covid, which is a little funny.
• 14:48
  But he's also gone in and he's got made sure that he's signed
• 14:54
  the players that he wanted to make sure that this team of his
• 14:58
  is going to be good enough. And I think, That's pretty
• 15:01
  important. Now, we already came in with
• 15:02
  some good players and Cavallo and Millet are low but he's been
• 15:07
  able to get Nick out Hines to come to the club playing at
• 15:10
  halfback. Which seems a bit strange to me
• 15:12
  but what do I know? I don't know anything about
• 15:14
  rugby league for new cans come to the club as well so he's
• 15:20
  going to be very solid there and they've got some good heads in
• 15:25
  Aden Tolman who's now at the club and Andrew for feeder will.
• 15:29
  Kenny Errect for food and make him into a footballer again.
• 15:33
  I don't know, but you've got to give it like a Fitzgibbon was
• 15:37
  such a fantastic player. In a very smart player, he's
• 15:40
  proven to be very smart assistant coach.
• 15:44
  We all knew that he was eventually going to be a
• 15:46
  first-grade coach and this is his chance.
• 15:48
  So you would expect that cronulla will certainly be the
• 15:52
  amazing improving side this year and if they don't play finals I
• 15:56
  can assure you that they will be very disappointed there in the
• 15:59
  Shire. That then leaves the two other
• 16:03
  teams that finished in that middle six last year, and I
• 16:05
  don't think that's going to change.
• 16:09
  There is the possibility of I would suspect that both will
• 16:13
  both teams, both the roosters and the heels could both make
• 16:16
  top for. There's no doubt about that.
• 16:18
  And perhaps, that could be at the expense of the rabbitohs who
• 16:23
  may or may not be as good as last year by making the Grand
• 16:26
  Final. But sadly, I don't think that
• 16:29
  either team really probably did enough in the market to improve
• 16:33
  themselves to make that top for this season.
• 16:38
  There's had enough trouble just holding onto players.
• 16:41
  And certainly next year are going to be losing a couple of
• 16:45
  their main at least a couple of their main players.
• 16:48
  So when they talk about Premiership Windows, I'm
• 16:51
  guessing that the Earl's Premiership window is going to
• 16:54
  be this season, or maybe bust. But to be honest with everybody
• 17:00
  and we all know the rules have a good squad and they are at
• 17:04
  exciting football team and they do play well in patches but they
• 17:08
  Have seen for two, three, four years to just been lacking that
• 17:11
  one extra element, that turns them into a Premiership, winning
• 17:15
  team. And given that they haven't
• 17:16
  actually bought anyone this season, then that Premiership
• 17:20
  winning element is still missing.
• 17:23
  The Roosters will improve because firstly all their
• 17:26
  injured players just about a little be back for the start of
• 17:29
  the Season although the ones who have retired because of injury
• 17:32
  will not the roosters are the roosters.
• 17:35
  They're always competitive, their coaches.
• 17:37
  Fantastic and gets the best out of all the players he has and
• 17:42
  when you've got an enormous salary cap that no one else has
• 17:44
  well you can do magic wonders. They are the ones whom that I
• 17:48
  feel could jump into that top for that.
• 17:50
  Weren't there last year obviously they Equal fourth last
• 17:54
  season, we're only beaten out by the seagulls on percentage and
• 17:58
  finishing in the top four is still pretty important.
• 18:00
  You need to finish in that top four, if you want to win the
• 18:02
  comp. So both the roosters in the
• 18:05
  hills and probably the Sharks will all be thinking, that's
• 18:08
  what they need to do. I'd probably think at this point
• 18:11
  in time, it's not quite there for them.
• 18:15
  They tried the same tactics on that.
• 18:37
  So that just leaves the top four and as much as there's been a
• 18:40
  lot of Doom and Gloom about well, at least 3 of the 4 teams
• 18:44
  that finished in the top four last year and how they're going
• 18:46
  to gain this year. I'm not sure that you can really
• 18:49
  see these going to be too much change up there.
• 18:52
  The seagulls were amazing last year.
• 18:55
  Given they lost their first three games and got up.
• 18:58
  And one that fourth game at the death, and then Tom treebo
• 19:03
  average returned and just took the team on his back.
• 19:07
  And drag them through for the rest of the season.
• 19:11
  So it was a really remarkable turnaround and I think that
• 19:15
  they've proven from last year that they are good enough to do
• 19:18
  it. Now, they could just as easily
• 19:20
  fall over again, is no doubt about that.
• 19:23
  And yeah, how many people would really be disappointed with that
• 19:28
  occurred, but they're a good-looking team and it turbo-4
• 19:31
  stays fit all season, if the veterans Cherry ever.
• 19:37
  Ins and foreign can continue to stay fit as well and do their
• 19:41
  job in the harms, then the seagulls are going to be a real
• 19:45
  threat again this season. The rabbitohs were Grand finals.
• 19:49
  Last year, they finished third on the table before making the
• 19:51
  Grand Final. They've lost their coach.
• 19:55
  They've lost their halfback. But the rest of the team has
• 19:58
  stayed pretty much the same. So as long as the gamble on
• 20:03
  allowing, Adam rentals to leave the club to go to Brisbane and
• 20:07
  let their young halfback prodigies come through and Are
• 20:14
  allowed to well much like seeing Walker with the roosters last
• 20:18
  year, be given the opportunity to run the team and if they're
• 20:22
  good enough as good as everyone seems to think they are at South
• 20:26
  and there's no reason why cos rabbitohs can't.
• 20:29
  Once again, Vie for that Premiership.
• 20:32
  And unless there is a major breakdown in that halfback
• 20:37
  position than you would expect. That the rabbitohs will be good
• 20:39
  enough to make that top four. Again, they had 20 wins last
• 20:43
  year, And you would expect that they can make at least, you
• 20:46
  know, 1618 again this year which will be good enough for top for
• 20:52
  the other two, of course, the storm who are getting old, have
• 20:57
  lost a few players, the for your backup players.
• 20:59
  I guess you'd almost say but for new can and Hines going to to
• 21:04
  cronulla probably heard some a little bit if they do get
• 21:07
  injuries. Craig, Bellamy is just a master
• 21:11
  though. It finding young kids or old
• 21:15
  timers who want a couple more extra years and bring them to
• 21:18
  the club and just continues to churn out these Seasons where
• 21:22
  they get 18 20 22 wins for the season and find their way into
• 21:27
  finals yet again, it just seems unlikely after the last two
• 21:32
  seasons, the storm of head that they would drop any further than
• 21:36
  that. Top four at the very worst, And
• 21:40
  of course more than likely challenging for the minor
• 21:43
  Premiership again. And the premiums Panthers.
• 21:47
  Well, they've lost Matt Burton, which is unfortunate for them,
• 21:50
  but they all knew that was going to happen, Nathan?
• 21:53
  Clear is out for the first three or four rounds.
• 21:56
  But apart from that, it Premiership sides, pretty much
• 21:58
  intact. And on paper, they have pretty
• 22:02
  much been the best team of the last two years.
• 22:05
  They probably should have won the Green final two years ago
• 22:07
  Against The Storm and they did win the comp last year.
• 22:10
  So there's no doubt that they will be out there again with all
• 22:15
  of the Presentative players. They will be fighting to win
• 22:19
  another Premiership and you would expect that they're going
• 22:21
  to be right. And again so I find it hard to
• 22:25
  see that top for changing from last year.
• 22:28
  That means it probably will. And if it does, the roosters are
• 22:32
  probably the team that would force one of those fort, one of
• 22:35
  those four teams out. And if I was going to stick a
• 22:39
  needle in it, then I'm guessing there would be the rabbitohs who
• 22:42
  would be the one who may drop out for the roosters.
• 22:47
  Jackson change direction there. Drop the kick down behind the
• 22:50
  defensive ball ricochets off Batman again, he's going to coin
• 22:54
  coins. Going to pass back on the
• 22:56
  inside. Is this?
• 23:18
  Let me tell you again, sir. So there you go.
• 23:23
  I might as well have just really at the ladder from last year and
• 23:25
  just get the top six as they were juggle.
• 23:28
  The couple from the bottom into the semi-final positions and
• 23:31
  then just rearrange the bottom but it's just the way this whole
• 23:35
  thing looks to me, it doesn't look like there's a whole lot of
• 23:38
  change going on. Like I said of the teams that
• 23:42
  should improve, the Bulldogs should improve the sharks.
• 23:45
  It should improve just from the changes in the plane Personnel
• 23:50
  that have come into those two teams and teams going down will.
• 23:56
  Again, that's difficult the knights and tight and sort of
• 23:58
  popped up last year and made the finals.
• 24:01
  That doesn't guarantee them a spot this year.
• 24:04
  The Raiders had a really poor Susan last year.
• 24:06
  You're not can't really see them being as poor again, so they may
• 24:09
  go up. The dragons.
• 24:12
  I think it'll be interesting to see how eye guy because the
• 24:16
  dragons are one of those things in their coach, who could make
• 24:21
  finals, because they've done it before in the past been with
• 24:24
  Mary, a couple of times they've made finals with a team that
• 24:27
  you're sort of thought really, so perhaps they could do that
• 24:31
  again. I don't know.
• 24:33
  But of the rest. The season ahead is even though
• 24:37
  they'll all be saying, we're looking for finals and we want
• 24:40
  to play finals. I think there's a lot of teams
• 24:43
  there who are just hoping to finish a couple of places
• 24:46
  further up the ladder than they did last year to get two or
• 24:49
  three extra Wings than they did last year.
• 24:52
  And then start looking towards 2023 as the year when they can
• 24:56
  start making finals and if they don't, well then there's going
• 25:01
  to be a lot more displeasure with Cut players or probably
• 25:06
  cages because it's always the coaches who get the blame.
• 25:10
  Anyway, that's the way I see the season going.
• 25:13
  I hope you enjoyed this first episode of in League with the
• 25:16
  NRL will be back next week with our usual review of the week
• 25:20
  talking point and then our preview of the next round.
• 25:25
  Well I hope it gives you entertain gives me something to
• 25:27
  do. Anyway thanks for tuning in and
• 25:31
  good punching. You have been listening to a
• 25:50
  metal, Kevin production. You have been listening to a
• 25:50
  metal, Kevin production.