Impact off the bench

[ChookMaster]

IMO our impact off the bench needs to be strong to stand a chance against the cowboys tmrw night. Will robbo make the switch between napa and moa before kick off to give us that impact off the bench? He did it a few times last year when we were up against strong packs, the cows have a strong starting pack then tamou to come on ( although his soft ) our forwards need to be on to win.

[Bigchook]

I hope napa starts. He doesn't have the leg speed to capitalise on tired bodies in the middle. He does have the aggression and intimidation to make the opposition forwards not run the ball. He can also soften them up. Whilst Moa is probably our strongest ball runner, it suits our team to have him coming off the bench. I just feel that this year needs be Evans year. If he can prove as worthy as napa has to us then our depth will be great and that will be the first step to going all the way.

[Parkway_Drive]

Agree, when Napa started and Moa came off the bench especially in the later stages of the regular season last year was probably the only time we looked really good last year. Having got rid of the Teddy Bears (FPN and Casty) and with the addition of youngster like Taukehio will give our bench some real punch especially if Moa comes off the bench.

[Darkone]

Bench rotation was good tonight
Mr T, the undertaker, Napalm all good

special mention for the Kiwi Mcwreak he did ok

[davos]

Yeah i don't think that either one of Evans / Napa have reached that brutal sort of level we all know they can. Until they do, our bench looks a bit soft.

On SST, its hard to judge a player after one game but i don't think he is anything special. I hope meehan gets back in the swing of things.

[TDK]

We definitely lose momentum when MOA and JWH come from the field. At this stage Napa and Evans are not yardage men, they cannot do the necessary grunt work that's required against the better teams. I'm hoping Kennedy and young Meehan can be fast tracked as a fall back position.

[Game Fowl]

I was really impressed with the way our starting forwards took it to the Cows nothing fancy just Hard , straight , quick and unrelenting .
This is what set the tone for the first half success and also the key to the second half demise.
Poor ball control can be attributed to trying to make the yards with out the effort of building pressure.

[Roostarz]

On SST, its hard to judge a player after one game but i don't think he is anything special. I hope meehan gets back in the swing of things.

Really? I rate him highly. Well known that he was one of our best pre-season but yesterday he did his job superbly, basically what FPN should have been doing for the last few years.

He was only out there for 20 minutes but he made near 20 tackles and more importantly he consistently made 10+ metres every hitup (5 runs for 56 metres I think it was) which is something we usually struggle with when JWH and Moa are both off the pitch - as well as making no errors. The little moment where he offloaded to Guerra could have been extraordinary had Guerra not been so close and had the ball bounce off his face.

[roosterproud]

that pass was ruled to be a knock on , but a ball deflecting of the face is not a knock on. its as funny as hell but no knock on.
we were not only screwed over in the penalities but also the 50 / 50 knock ons

[Chooky Chookerson]

I was very pleased with what I saw from him. He looked very comfortable out there against a big pack. I would be happy the see him in the 17 against souths