Is our spot in the 8 confirmed?

[Roosta4life]

Noticed a journo in yesterdays presser said our spot in the 8 was 'all but confirmed'. With Canberra winning today they are back within one game of us. Assuming we beat Wests next week we are onto 28 points. However, if we lose to both the Storm and the Rabbitohs, we will be relying on Canberra to lose at least one of their last three, or else they will leapfrog us onto 30 pts. Canberra don't play another team below them.
We have been playing some excellent footy over the last month and if we make the finals, I firmly believe we are a chance of winning four games on the trot. But we may have to either beat Melbourne in Melbourne, or snap our losing streak against Souths to even qualify. What does the pen think?

[BraveTheWorld]

Well, our finals placing is not guaranteed until we win another two games. That being said, I’ll be somewhat surprised if the Raiders don’t choke one of their remaining games. They’re not a good team, and were pretty fortunate to get the bickies against St Merge today.

I think we’ll beat the Storm in Melbourne, but not so sure about the Bunnies.

The Storm are having a similar season to what we have had the last couple of years. Lots and lots of injuries. They beat Penrith minus Luai, Cleary, May, Edwards and Fischer-Harris. The Panthers were never going to win that game. I think that game was a bit of a false-dawn for the Storm, and I predict we’ll handle them unless we suffer injuries next week.

Tauks and Collins will be back for that Storm game. Going to be a big ask for them to beat us, even in Melbourne.

[Tommy Smith]

Honestly if we're good enough it's not even worth worrying about.

We are light years better than Canberra. That's why I was never worried about comparing the difficulty of our draw vs theirs.

We've just smashed Brisbane and the Cowboys. And it's because we're a contender. Canberra are an atrocious pretender.

We'll make the 8. Guaranteed.

[Keith]

We need to win 2 more games to make the 8.
So that means we need to beat Tigers first , then we need to beat Storm or Rabbits and we finish on 30 points. and come 7th or 8th.
If we only win 1 more game then we finish 9th , and desrve an early end.

Having said that we need to take each game one at a time , and put our best ream out there and run hard , tackle hard , the Rooster's way and we can go far.

[King Salvo]

30 points will be the minimum to make the 8 and possible for and against will come into play


Panthers - 38 - Rabbitohs/Warriors/Cowboys - 40 points - 2 50-50 games

Cowboys - 32 - Warriors/Rabbitohs/Panthers - 34 points - 2 50-50 games

Sharks - 32- Sea Eagles/Bulldogs/Knights - 36 points - 1 50-50 games

As per the above the Top 3 is sorted - 4 to 8 up for grabs - 3 of those team in Storm/Eels/Brisbane will be on 30 points at least - Storm already on 30 and Eels and Brisbane with games they should win to reach 30 at least

Roosters will have to win 2 games - Raiders have 3 very winnable games now - Manly played like they have holidays on their minds and thus the Raiders could well reach the 30 points minimum as well


Storm - 30 - Broncos/Roosters/Eels - 30 points - 3 - 50-50 games
Eels - 28- Bulldogs/Broncos/Storm - 30 points - 2- 50-50 games
Broncos - 28 -Storm/Eels/Dragons - 30 points - 2 50-50 games


Rabbitohs - 28 -Panthers/Cowboys/Roosters - 28 points - 3 50-50 games

Roosters -26- Tigers/Storm/Rabbitohs - 28 points with 2- 50-50 games

Raiders 24 - Knights/Sea Eagles/Tigers - 28 points with 1 -50-50 games

[bondi.boy]

Well, our finals placing is not guaranteed until we win another two games. That being said, I’ll be somewhat surprised if the Raiders don’t choke one of their remaining games. They’re not a good team, and were pretty fortunate to get the bickies against St Merge today.

I think we’ll beat the Storm in Melbourne, but not so sure about the Bunnies.

The Storm are having a similar season to what we have had the last couple of years. Lots and lots of injuries. They beat Penrith minus Luai, Cleary, May, Edwards and Fischer-Harris. The Panthers were never going to win that game. I think that game was a bit of a false-dawn for the Storm, and I predict we’ll handle them unless we suffer injuries next week.

Tauks and Collins will be back for that Storm game. Going to be a big ask for them to beat us, even in Melbourne.

Panthers team was still a good one...they couldn't even score one point against the Storm in 80 minutes.
When do we ever beat the Storm, let alone in Melbourne?

We might beat the Storm, but they must be hot favourites.

[Tom Verlaine's Ghost]

If we finish 8th and Souths 5th, we'll be playing them again in week 1 ...

[Mickie Lane]

If the Chooks beat the Tigers then they stay in the fight.

[Eggspert]

We need to win every game we play but take it one game at a time. It's a game of two halves & we must run hard & tackle hard.

We must complete our sets & kick well. We need our forwards to go forward & our backs to finish it off. We need to score more points than the opposition to come out on top. The only thing we need to worry about is the 2 points. No team has won a GF after having 50 points put on them.

Finals football is a different game & it doesn't matter where you finish during the regular season.......I think I covered all the relevant Rugby League quotes. Let me know if I missed any.

[King Salvo]

Raiders have a very good draw playing teams below them though - Knights/ Sea Eagles/ Tigers and could well finish on 30 - the way Manly played today does not give one confidence they may be able to beat the Raiders in 2 weeks time.

[ism22]

If the Chooks beat the Tigers then they stay in the fight.

Yeah the Faders have Newcastle, Manly and Tigpies.

Our PD means they (realistically) need one more win than us (121 for us v -31 for them). That is... if we lose to the Drizz and Souffs then the Raders only have to beat Newcastle and the Tigpies to beat us to #8.

They have the easier job than us IMO but seriously fark the ladder and fark the Faders... we NEED to earn our place in these finals. If we can't beat Souffs and the Drizz then we might as well finish 9th coz we're not gonna win the premiership!

We're not some diversity inclusion that will hopefully finish above the Faders and get to play a token game of finals for 2022 as our 'reward for trying hard'. We need to play MUCH better than that.

When Collins and SST return, IMO there's no excuses for dropping our last two games. I want us finishing 5th, if not higher!

[Mickie Lane]

We need to win every game we play but take it one game at a time. It's a game of two halves & we must run hard & tackle hard.

We must complete our sets & kick well. We need our forwards to go forward & our backs to finish it off. We need to score more points than the opposition to come out on top. The only thing we need to worry about is the 2 points. No team has won a GF after having 50 points put on them.

Finals football is a different game & it doesn't matter where you finish during the regular season.......I think I covered all the relevant Rugby League quotes. Let me know if I missed any.

What about
Line speed with our D
Leg speed post contact from the middles.
Edges have to run the right line to put pressure on the oppositions D
Youve gotta do it for the boys.

[Eggspert]

What about
Line speed with our D
Leg speed post contact from the middles.
Edges have to run the right line to put pressure on the oppositions D
Youve gotta do it for the boys.

Yes of course! Don't forget not sticking to the game plan.

[bondi.boy]

If we finish 8th and Souths 5th, we'll be playing them again in week 1 ...

Last time we beat Souths was in May 2020.
Since then Souths have beaten us every time,
Twice last year, one game we lost 8-60.

This season they've already beaten us once.
We might make the 8, but unless we've worked out how to stop Latrell, Walker and Johnston we're doomed again.

[Steakface]

We will beat the tigers, and we will beat the Storm and that will be enough to make it.

Our 3 big challenges are:

- Bunnies - I hate to say it, but Fatrrell always turns up for us and are going to be tough to beat.

- Concussion - we have certain players susceptible, and we are going to need a lot of luck on our side here

- we will be bottom 4. Statistically, it is not likely we take the premiership due to that fact. That extra game of intense finals footy kills teams, regardless of how good they are doing. Robbo and team will need to work wonders on our fitness management over the next 3-4 weeks.