Official Siosifa Talakai

[Chad]

While it was always unfair and unrealistc to expect Sifa to live up to the hype and expectation following his demolition job on Manly (you can't do that every week) he has still being going fairly well running the ball hard and whacking blokes in defense.

There has been less good opportunities for his passing and kicking game with the whole teams structure and ryhtm disjointed and looking more flat and less smooth. He is getting smothered and rushed up on by multiple defenders cutting down his impact and we haven't been able to come up with a counter play to take advantage of this.

Having said all that I think his effectivness in the centres is starting to wane a bit and on the weekend he missed alot of tackles so when he is fit I am happy enough to bring him back into the forwards rotation. Might freshen him up a bit as well

Tracey is having a red hot crack at centre showing improvement and Ramien will be back. Plus we are down on forwards with no BHU, Dale or Jack Williams.

If there is something worse than marking up on Talakai for 80 mins it might be marking up on a Talakai that can put all his strength and energy into a 30-40 min spell

It wasn't that he didn't used to be damaging coming from the bench it's just we saw less of him and in less space

Agreed Gards, I think when Jesse is back and Connor is fit, then that'll be our centre pairing. Sifa can still do a great job from the forward rotation and we certainly need it at the moment.

 

[Super Impose]

Looks set to be named ..

 

[Gumby]

Good to see he’s ok

 

[bort]

Okay I chased this up, he wasn’t saying it was rare he was saying it was variable in how impactful it was.

Commonly up towards 12 weeks but can be minor (4-6 weeks) or if requiring surgery can be more like 3-6 months.

Similar area of foot bones injuries can also be very complex to heal. Whole area gets bad blood flow.
Woods was out for approx 3 months with foot fracture in this area for us a few years back.

I thought it looked like they were treating Talakai as an ankle sprain in game though. Anyone hear anything otherwise yet?

Further to this on Lisfranc injuries NRL Physio just posted

“Assessments are ongoing, but initial specialist reviews have been better than expected for Addin Fonua-Blake. The hope now is he can avoid surgery & the associated 3+ month recovery period. He is still likely to miss multiple weeks (2-6), but that’s an improvement on early fears.”

 

[Wizard]

This guy is a tank and has God like timing on his passes

What a freak

 

[mr.sharkiee]

Doing a good job, but would love to see him in the forwards. We are lacking so much muscle and mongrel in the forwards.

 

[Thresher Shark]

Wouldn't mind screwing with the opposition's heads by swapping him between centre and the forwards throughout the game

 

[Proud Shark]

Wouldn't mind scewing with the opposition's heads by swapping him between centre and the forwards throughout the game

Haha just said something similar in the Tracey thread. I think it makes a lot of sense.

 

[Jasonstevenswedgie]

Agreed Gards, I think when Jesse is back and Connor is fit, then that'll be our centre pairing. Sifa can still do a great job from the forward rotation and we certainly need it at the moment.

how many line breaks does ronnie make without sifa at centre? is a it a coincidence that ronnie isnt doing his kamakazie runs in of the wing in defense with sifa inside him?

 

[Super Impose]

Our forwards are lacking so much punch with multiple injuries .

I really think Sifa is needed there at the moment , especially given Ramien’s return .

With a fortnight to our next game though - we might get a middle back though - Dale ?

 

[apezza]

Our forwards are lacking so much punch with multiple injuries .

I really think Sifa is needed there at the moment , especially given Ramien’s return .

With a fortnight to our next game though - we might get a middle back though - Dale ?

I think Dale is still at least 5 weeks away.

Original prognosis was around 6 weeks from memory. They will probably give him an extra week or so after that.

We need to get another 3.5 years out of him

 

[Gards]

Sifa is still doing alot of work in the centres and carting it up like a forward but has a great passing ability. If he wasn't played there last night we prob score at least 1 less try

There was a carry late in the game where he sent the defender flying back into the grand stands. If we shift him to forwards we need a strong player like Ikavlu to take over not Tracey.

Sifa has handled being an 80 min player better than alot of us would have expected. In the forwards no way he can get near those minutes so we might only have him for 40-50 mins a game.

We were alot better with Jesse in the other centre spot as we didn't just have to go to Sifa everytime, Jesse was damaging as well.

Sifa is running into a brick wall of 4 defenders and that's on the edge but he just keeps doing. Won't be easier in the middle though I think he can still be damaging there we lose those opportunities on the edges he creates from the quick Moylan spread.

 

[Sparkles]

Sifa is still doing alot of work in the centres and carting it up like a forward but has a great passing ability. If he wasn't played there last night we prob score at least 1 less try

There was a carry late in the game where he sent the defender flying back into the grand stands. If we shift him to forwards we need a strong player like Ikavlu to take over not Tracey.

Sifa has handled being an 80 min player better than alot of us would have expected. In the forwards no way he can get near those minutes so we might only have him for 40-50 mins a game.

We were alot better with Jesse in the other centre spot as we didn't just have to go to Sifa everytime, Jesse was damaging as well.

Sifa is running into a brick wall of 4 defenders and that's on the edge but he just keeps doing. Won't be easier in the middle though I think he can still be damaging there we lose those opportunities on the edges he creates from the quick Moylan spread.

I think we need to depend less on one bloke being an unstoppable beast and creating opportunities. Between Nicho, Kennedy and Tracey we have pace to burn and should be creating a lot more through structured play then we are now

 

[Paul C]

Sifa back to edge or Bench.

Ramien and Connor in the centres.

1 fluky game is not enough.

 

[Wizard]

how many line breaks does ronnie make without sifa at centre? is a it a coincidence that ronnie isnt doing his kamakazie runs in of the wing in defense with sifa inside him?

Ronaldo has plenty to thank Talakai for this year

 

[HaroldBishop]

1 fluky game is not enough.

Not sure what you mean?

 

[Jasonstevenswedgie]

7 lba
6 ta
5 tries
6 lb
67 tb
8 offloads
1799 m at 150 game avg.
most run metres of any shark
first 3 games as a forward he ran less than his avg
our best centre a long way

 

[Proud Shark]

7 lba
6 ta
5 tries
6 lb
67 tb
8 offloads
1799 m at 150 game avg.
most run metres of any shark
first 3 games as a forward he ran less than his avg
our best centre a long way

I was interested in how this compared so I ran it back against Tracey's stats at centre last year.

4 LBA
3 TA
8 Tries
6 LB
26 TB
2 Offloads
143m per game.

It's worth noting that Tracey played one extra game there than Talakai has this year. Also hard to compare given the different structures of the two sides year to year.

Another interesting point is Talakais stats from that ridiculous 40m against Manly.
2 Tries, 3 Linebreaks, 2 Linebreak assists, 3 Try assists, 3 offloads, 8 Tackle Breaks and 262m.

So he has achieved almost half of those 'try involvement' stats in 40 minutes of football. Take this away and the rest of his games he has a similar output to Tracey (asside from tackle breaks which is the big outlier).

TLDR: Outside of that 40m against Manly, I don't think there is that much of a gap in performance between him and Tracey.

 

[Jasonstevenswedgie]

they are both very similar defensively also this year.
maybe we should compare the two players this year though
sifa 9 games at centre to conners 5 ( think he played one on the wing 135 m, 2 lb, 4 tb)

similar stats for both players sifa making 30m a game on avg more this year.

i would prefer sifas silky hands at centre to traceys

 

[Proud Shark]

they are both very similar defensively also this year.
maybe we should compare the two players this year though
sifa 9 games at centre to conners 5 ( think he played one on the wing 135 m, 2 lb, 4 tb)

similar stats for both players sifa making 30m a game on avg more this year.

i would prefer sifas silky hands at centre to traceys

I think if the conversation is player for player I prefer Sifa there too. But with how we are struggling in the middle, I think it makes sense for him to move there and have Tracey fill the centre spot. Then just push Sifa wide in attacking shape and occasionally at other times to try get him one on one with a defender.