Round 1 saw the new look Pumas Under 18s head to Palm Beach to play the highly fancied Palm Beach Currumbin team. The game unfortunately was pretty much over at half time with the highly skilled and well drilled PBC unit running hard and giving the young Pumas a bit of a footy lesson. 48-16 at the break and it could have been a lot worse if not for the efforts of our defensive unit that was put under so much pressure by the teams overall unwillingness or inability to run hard with their oponents in defence or run hard to space in offence. I think it was a real wake up call for many about what is required at Under 18 level.
The second half the boys went out with a new structure and some new instructions and immediately started to show that they were getting the idea. The second half was much closer and a much more even contest because we simply started to work harder all over the ground. Whilst the final score was 92-50 the second half saw them outscore us only 43-34 but 9 scoring shots each and our stats looked much healthier than they did at half time.
Ok it was not a great start but when you consider the talent we had watching the game, unable to play and who should start filtering back over the next few weeks, and the improvement shown after half time, there will be better days ahead. We need to heed the lessons from the game and make sure we dont fall into the same traps against Griffith/Moorooka this week. Despite them getting a bit of a touch up from Surfers (and they wont be the last) they have some good kids from Sherwood and will be a handful for us.
As for better players today, Gunny was our best and absolutely remarkable how a bloke who hasn't trained and who only came down to help us out with numbers could dominate so much across half back. By the time he went off just before 3/4 time with an injury I reckon he had a dozen marks and 20 possessions, unbelievable game. I have said it before and I will say it again why Josh are you wasting your talent and not playing? Neal Collins at Full Back was awesome all day as was stand in skipper James Halpin across half back as well. If it werent for these three, and Creamy too did some good work down there, we would have been 12 goals down at half time easy and probably lost by 20. Jordan Mckinlay and Chris Kassulke (virtually rucking on his own) were really honest and hard working all day and in the second half I was really pleased with Josh Mackey in the midfield and "Will" D'Allura up forward using the spaces to really test the PBC defence. Raabs also showed some good signs but I already know what he can do, once he gets a little more help he will be very damaging I have no doubt.
Heads up, its only round 1, see you all at training on wednesday.
Last Modified on 12/04/2011 09:22