This week on Bondi Rescue

Drowning attack spotted outside the flags

Cast your mind back to the take cycle of the preseason, a time where ladder predictions reign supreme. Wherever you looked, there was a fair chance the Sydney Roosters were front and centre of the takestorm as March premiers.

Certainly, the handsome writer of this particular weekly newsletter allowed himself to be swept off the feet by the sweet nothings coming out of the Eastern suburbs of Sydney in the offseason.

After all, adding a representative calibre utility forward to an already frightening pack, coupled with the quality on show in the backs from the likes of James Tedesco and Joey Manu, expected growth from Joseph-Aukuso Sua’ali’i and Sam Walker, and you’d be forgiven for thinking this group would march the regular season.

Truth be told, that may still happen.

Following the conclusion of Round 11, the Roosters sit a modest tenth on the ladder, with five wins and five losses, last in a cluster of four teams clumped together on 12 competition points by virtue of their ghastly points differential, not helped by an embarrassing trouncing at the hands of Penrith on Friday night out at the foot of the mountains to the tune of 48-4. A final insult on a night where the mountain men celebrated their 2003 heroes that conquered these very same Roosters 20 years ago.

I don’t usually do much actual hard game analysis in here, preferring to focus more on storylines and vibes over numbers and graphs, but I will break character for a moment to run through some of the keys from Friday’s pummelling (all from the NRL website match centre).

Possession? The Roosters only had 41%.

Completion rate? Sydney were an abysmal 24/35 (68%), while Penrith were far more clinical at 41/46 (89%).

That time out of possession added up, as the Roosters were forced to make 411 tackles to Penrith’s 279, while missing 35 (to be fair Penrith missed 30).

The major key though, to me, and this was evident without even needing to look at numbers, was how easily the Roosters were emasculated through the middle of the field.

Penrith ran for nearly 1000 more metres than the Roosters over the course of the 80 minutes (2136m to 1199m), with the Roosters struggling to an average set distance of just over 34m, compared to over 46m for the Panthers. Penrith also racked up 524m post contact compared to just 280m from the Roosters.

Not a single Roosters forward ran for over 100m on the night, with Matt Lodge the closest at 98 and Sitili Tupouniua with 84 run metres. Meanwhile, the Roosters leading metre maker over the course of the night, Corey Allan, ran for 132 metres.

That would’ve ranked 11th on the Panthers.

I watch the Roosters this season, as I do with every team, and wonder what the plan is long term here. Some teams it’s easy to make out straight away what the end goal is, while for the bad teams that can be a bit hazier.

I am unsure what the hell the Roosters are doing right now.

Again, let’s throw it back to preseason.

There was universal salivation at the prospect of Brandon Smith joining this team. He himself spoke about the gravitas and legacy of playing for the Bondi club, and how he was sold after hearing the reverence in which his then-future teammates held someone like Nick Politis and Trent Robinson in.

The Roosters have built and based their success as much on being a brand and an idea as they have on being an actual football team, and to be honest there’s nothing wrong with that.

You may remember a few editions ago, writing about Canberra and Jack Wighton, I said how some teams build from within while some go shopping (full piece below if you missed it).

Well, in the lens of that analogy about ‘flyover’ cities vs. big markets, the Roosters are about as glamour as you can get in the NRL. Due to their location and area demographics, their junior base is supremely limited and constricted. They’re not in a growth area like Penrith, and they don’t have monopoly on big city areas like Brisbane.

As such, the Roosters rely on buying players and building through the market rather than developing their own to deliver sustained success. It’s a strategy that has drawn ire and “salary sombrero” monikers from rival fans but sometimes you have to do what’s right for your situation, and to be honest if the Roosters went down the locals-first path then they’d probably end up near the bottom of the ladder.

It’s a strategy that has brought them Brandon Smith this past offseason, poached Sua’ali’i from South Sydney, delivered them Origin stars like James Tedesco and Angus Crichton and, going further back, the ageless Jared Waerea-Hargreaves.

It doesn’t stop here either, with both Spencer Leniu (Penrith) and Dominic Young (Newcastle) already locked up for 2024 and beyond as well, with Leniu going so far as branding the Roosters the “pinnacle of the NRL”. That coming from someone who has been on perhaps the most dominant club side of the NRL era might be baffling, but it still shows the prestige in which the club is held.

Leniu and Young are good signings, both for now and the future. Young is an established England star and one of the most vibrant and exciting young outside backs in the game capable of playing anywhere along the backline. Leniu, meanwhile, is one of the game’s upcoming promising tearaway forwards, a two time Premiership winner stuck behind Moses Leota and James Fisher-Harris at Penrith. He’d be in consideration for a bench spot for NSW in Origin had he not ruptured his testicle in Penrith training during the week.

But are Young and Leniu the signings to take the Roosters back over the top and turn them into that dynasty capable of challenging the likes of Penrith, South Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne?

From what I can tell by trying to read the tea leaves (ie, Roosters fans on Twitter), there’s a bit of sentiment towards the side right now that it’s a case of “throw all the good players in the spine and hope it works” and honestly, I get it.

James Tedesco and Joey Manu are two of the absolute premier standout players of the competition. Tedesco is the NSW and Australia incumbent fullback, almost the first name on the team sheet for both rep sides, while Manu is one of those players who just makes things look effortless both for the Roosters and New Zealand.

But in truth, there isn’t a lot of nuance to either of their games, and that stark reality is on full display over the last two weeks, two shattering losses to Penrith and a struggling North Queensland where they’ve scored a combined 10 points.

The Roosters can’t score points, and no amount of under 7-level “give it to Teddy” is going to fix that.

I’ll give you a guess as to where the Roosters rank in total points so far this season.

Have you had a guess?

Have you guessed yet?

Last chance to guess.

Ok here goes.

16th. Second last. 157 total points. Only the Wests Tigers at a putrid 136 rank lower.

A side possessing the attacking talent of the likes of Tedesco, Manu and Sua’ali’i shouldn’t be scratching around to not even average 16 points a game. So what the hell gives?

Let’s start with injuries. Connor Watson hasn’t played a game this season, while both Daniel Tupou and Paul Momirovski are currently long term absentees. But Watson is a utility and Momirovski is a depth outside back at best. Tupou is important to the Roosters with his yardage work and aerial threat in the red zone but, he is still a winger, his loss shouldn’t matter that much.

The humbling to Penrith didn’t come free either, with Joey Manu (ankle) and Jared Waerea-Hargreaves (pectoral) both leaving the game early. No timelines yet for either of those but JWH has been a consistent force for the Roosters in the middle despite his advanced age, and Manu is still a game breaker.

Besides injuries though, there’s been some pretty poor mismanagement of talent by Trent Robinson, especially through the spine.

While at the Storm, Brandon Smith split hooking duties sporadically with Harry Grant, until it became clear just how good Grant was. The drop off in service was noticeable from Grant to Smith whenever Grant went off the field or was missing through injury, as was the case early in 2022.

In all seriousness, the hooking stocks for the Roosters are somewhat grim. Smith is best as a punishing lock/prop hybrid, while the other options are a currently-injured Connor Watson (who is also more utility than true hooker), Jake Turpin (who the Broncos paid to go away in essence) and the non-perishable Drew Hutchison (although he’s usually being pressed into service as a pseudo-centre due to the swathe of outside back injuries the Roosters seem to go through on a weekly basis).

We’ve seen how important hooker is in the modern game (look at Penrith before they got Api Koroisau in 2020, and now that he’s gone again). Yet, it seems to be the one spine position teams feel they can cheap out of the most, and it’s no different in Bondi.

Smith is by no means a budget signing money wise, but it again points to the notion of shoving in a big name and assuming talent will compensate for a lack of familiarity and feel for the position.

How about what’s going on in the halves at the moment? The Roosters may have the worst kicking game in the competition by a wide margin, and this was before they dropped Sam Walker to reserve grade.

Luke Keary has no sophistication to his kicking game while Sam Walker’s childlike build isn’t conducive to anything more than a blitzkrieg of midfield bombs and 30m drop punts.

But then Walker is dropped to allow Manu closer to the ball as a roaming five-eighth. I’ll go on record as saying I didn’t necessarily hate the decision to drop Walker. Sometimes, it’s best for a young player to go into reserve grade for a week to build some confidence by stat padding against lower level competition.

That doesn’t really seem to have been the plan though. Since being dropped after Round 7, Walker hasn’t really been close to playing first grade, save for being 18th man in Round 9. To make matters worse, not only was Walker, by some reports, merely going okay in reserve grade, he’s now injured.

In a tactic based on performance, not only has it resulted in the health of your long term half being compromised, but to be brutally honest there needs to be some tough conversations about Luke Keary too. I can’t watch the ghost of Keary wander around the field most weeks and not think he should probably have some time on the sidelines too.

This hodgepodge halves sequence hasn’t helped Tedesco at the back either. Right now some of the worst qualities of Tedesco’s game are being highlighted. While I don’t think there’s any real danger of him losing his Blues position, he’s absolutely not the form fullback in NSW right now. At his worst, Tedesco goes hunting for the ball too often, running aimlessly and trying to do everything by himself in a whirlwind of chaotic energy. It looks good on the stat sheet but stifles an already anemic product.

The last square piece in the round hole of the puzzle of confusion is Sua’ali’i playing in the centres. Sua’ali’i’s best attribute right now is his strong ball carrying ability, especially out of his own end. After a really strong season for the Roosters on the wing, he was brought into the centre position to get closer to the action, except it hasn’t worked.

His running output is down nearly 30 metres a game, while through 10 games he only has 1 try and 3 line breaks. For comparison, last year he finished with 15 tries and 16 line breaks, a clear sign of a decrease in involvement.

Centre in the modern game is a funny position. There’s more craft and nuance in it than I feel a lot of people recognise. Centres, much like second rowers, aren’t usually workhorses that stuff stat sheets with monster running games or a mountain of tackles.

Centres are the gold leaf on a fancy cocktail, the final garnish on a hearty meal. That isn’t to say there aren’t centres who embody the workmanship side of the game, because there certainly are (Campbell Graham springs to mind), but it isn’t a common trait for the position.

Right now Sua’ali’i is playing like a winger infield, rather than a centre. If it is truly about getting the best out of him for the good of the team, wing is his spot right now.

Right now, the Sydney Roosters are a collection of greedy teenagers all trying to impress the one pretty girl on the sidelines. There’s a lot of huff and puff to their attack, a lot of flashy goose stepping, flamboyant cut out passes and frivolous offloading.

There’s also, ultimately, a sheer lack of substance to any of that pomp and circumstance.

Everyone’s preseason favourites might have to follow the Knights lead and start looking at flights to Bali unless things change soon.