Oscar has pinched Jason’s pen and paper to bring you the NRL Preview Notepad each week in 2024. Here’s everything you need to know heading into NRL Round 3.
Thursday Night Members Preview
There’s a bit of shine taken off the whole “2023 Grand Final Rematch” pitch here given the number of key players missing from that said rematch.
A Perfect Storm
Xavier Coates’ match winner and Moses Leota’s show stopper rightly demanded the headlines following Melbourne’s miracle comeback win in NRL Round 2.
It was a brace for Ryan Papenhuyzen with the game in the balance that had rugby league nerds like me most excited though.
It was quintessential Melbourne Storm; two identical looks for two mirror-image tries, one on the left edge through Joe Chan and the other through Eli Katoa on the right.
Meticulous, well drilled, finitely detailed; a perfect Storm.
The catch and pass back on the inside from both backrowers will show in the highlights but there were two key things Melbourne did right in the lead up to Papenhuyzen going over.
The first was the width of the passes:
Harry Grant’s wide service from dummy-half allows Jahrome Hughes to hold three Warriors middles with a decoy and begin to get the interest of the four-in defender.
Another wide pass from there finds Trent Loiero who is able to nail the second key element in these scoring actions; engaging the right defender in the line.
The freeze-frame below shows Loiero straightening on the five-man (Tyran Wishart) to turn the four-man (Kurt Capewell) in on the lead decoy (Tui Kamikamica).
Thanks to Loiero’s convincing ballplaying, Capewell can’t slide off Kamikamica just yet while Shaun Johnson is worrying about three Storm jumpers in shape to his outside.
That disconnect ultimately becomes the space for Papenhuyzen to sneak through, three passes later.
And so Melbourne rinsed and repeated it on the other edge.
It’s Jonah Pezet in for Loiero here, bringing a lead runner onto the ball to stretch the space between the three- and four-in defenders.
Sitting out at left centre, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck actually sees what’s coming here and tries to push Luke Metcalf one channel further infield but it all happens too fast:
Metcalf holds on his man, Jackson Ford can’t recover from the inside in time and Papenhuyzen slices through for his second.
Loiero is still adjusting to this new role but he is providing Melbourne with a ball playing option that they didn’t have through the middle last year.
And given it’s the first time we’ve seen him and the Storm fall into this shape, we can assume there is still room for improvement…
Lachlan Ilias
Speaking of improvement, it won’t surprise to see South Sydney do just that this week.
Cameron Murray is back in the middle and Jack Wighton’s yardage game can positively change how Souths get downfield and on the attack. There is potential in the few different looks we’ve already seen from their left edge this year too – looks that should only improve with Wighton slotting in.
Overall though, the attention will all – rightly or wrongly – fall on Dean Hawkins this week given how he finds himself back in the NRL.
Instead of adding to the exhausting Jason Demetriou / Latrell Mitchell rhetoric, I shared my thoughts around Lachlan Ilias’ actual on-field role on the Neds Unpopular Opinions Podcast this week.
It feels like Ilias has been made into a scapegoat here but if there is one area even he will admit needs improvement, it’s his general play kicking.
If Hawkins can find the corners and put some polish on the end of Souths sets, he’ll go a long way to extending his time in first-grade.
What role Hawkins is given in this Rabbitohs attack while there is the other key watch. Is he simply a pivot for Cody Walker and Latrell Mitchell on the edges or does he bring his on-the-ball role from NSW Cup into first-grade?
Taylan May
He’s been solid so far but Taylan May will continue to be a target for attacking teams as he transitions into the centres at NRL level.
One action from NRL Round 2 stood out to me though as Parramatta tried to get at May down the short side in yardage.
On the back of some ruck speed, Bryce Cartwright gets over the ad-line here to bring Will Penisini onto the ball off his hip:
Without any inside pressure from the markers, Jarome Luai, May and Brian To’o are left in a three-on-four situation down the short side. Luai has to take the ball so May follows him in as he should.
He doesn’t overcommit though.
Loading his right foot and dropping his inside shoulder, May checks Penisini’s lead line then quickly slides when the ball goes out the back. He easily chases down Mitch Moses from there to complete a very confident specialist-centre action.
I’m keeping a closer eye on May’s defensive movements this weekend.
ICYMI: Manly’s evolving attack
I spent Monday’s video review breaking down how Jake Trbojevic is helping to set up Luke Brooks down Manly’s left edge in attack.
Admittedly it’s one of the more inconspicuous combinations in this Sea Eagles squad right now when compared to the likes of Daly Cherry-Evans and Haumole Olakau’atu on the other side of the field.
The big backrower had 20 receipts in Round 1 and another 19 in Round 2 against the Roosters, but what the numbers don’t show are the variety of his receipts.
Double leads, reverse blocks, jockey shapes, dropping back under; Cherry-Evans and Olakau’atu are toying with edge defenders this season and that should continue on Sunday against a new-look Eels left edge…
Lachlan Galvin
Numbers rarely paint the full picture and we don’t often read too heavily into statistics here at RLWriters. Sometimes though, a number stands out and in NRL Round 2 it came from within a comfortably beaten Wests Tigers side.
Ignore young Lachlan Galvin’s two handling errors or three penalties and zero in on this number for a moment: 50 receipts.
On debut against Canberra last week, Galvin didn’t stop looking for the ball. Some of the fundamentals of his game – straightening before passing, engaging the right defenders, his pass vs run selections – really impressed as Galvin embraced the primary playmaker role.
He’ll have the more experienced Aiden Sezer out there for longer on Saturday night and I’m interested to see how that impacts Galvin’s time on the ball.