Ricky Is Gone, But We Are Still Alive: Gallen
Ricky Is Gone, But We Are Still Alive: Gallen
Paul Gallen
28/07/2010 6:44:24 PM
The preparation we had was pretty good lastweek, things actually went a lot smoother than people would think.
We had a good training session Friday before we travelled to Canberra. It was a nice relaxing time, some of us checked out the casino and we were feeling really positive.
The game itself, we started really well which was one of our goals and we did that by scoring first. We had a lot of momentum and I thought we should have scored three tries in first half.
Scott Porter was a touch off side, and then we had another opportunity to score when Grant Millington put a chip and chase through.
After that a little bit of momentum turned their way and they got a try although, I felt we had the better of them in the first half.
Our forwards probably got the better of their forwards and that’s one of their big strengths.
Josh Dugan is their other strength and we struggled a bit to control him.
We got a field goal on halftime which we thought would help us in the back end of the game so all in all the first half was really positive for us.
The halftime speech was good; Flanno (Shane Flanagan) was really upbeat and happy.
He said the main thing we had to do was work on controlling Dugan a little bit.
We went back out after halftime and things never really went bad for us, it just worked out that Canberra got a couple of penalties and had the momentum.
I honestly don’t even think we had the ball for maybe then one or two sets in the first twenty minutes of the second half.
We found it hard to stop them and it just seemed to continue from there.
Our kicking game wasn’t very good and that’s been a problem we have had all year, we just can’t seem to get a good fifth tackle option.
Kade Snowden scored a great individual try!
He got the ball about 10 metres out flat footed and managed to muscle his way over so it was a good effort especially from a front rower.
We got a little bit of moment back and we kicked it into their in goal and I was penalised for a tackle on Dugan which was a little bit dubious.
I definitely had contact with his shoulder so that was unfortunate the 50-50 call went against us.
I would have liked to see us get a drop out and then a try; it would have been a cracking finish.
To Canberra’s credit their second half was better than ours, their forwards rolled forward and controlled the ball well and kicked well which was the difference.
On a positive side for us, their forward pack is probably one of the biggest in the game so it was good that we had it all over them in the first half.
If they didn’t have so much ball in the second half we probably would have had them too.
Nathan Gardner has been a real find for us and is someone who can cement his spot at fullback next year.
Ben Pomeroy has come back from hand surgery, he had two months off and he’s been back for four games now and got a try in three out of the four games and he’s getting back into his rep form which is a real positive.
In saying that we’ve got to be honest!
We still lost and it wasn’t good enough. Were not just here to make up numbers, we want to compete and win some.
http://www.sharks.com.au/?s=article-display&id=28387