Waikato after the Canterbury and Northland skid or the Manawatu rout?
Two heavy defeats either side of one good win, and suddenly the ledger is up for debate. I could be wrong, but I'd put more weight on the skid than the Manawatu game. Look at the margins: minus 22 at home to Canterbury on 5 September, minus 17 away to Northland a week later, then a nine-point win over Manawatu at FMG Stadium Waikato on the 19th. Concede 36 and 34 in consecutive weeks and one solid outing doesn't wipe that out - the sample is three matches, and two of them were ugly.
The counter-argument is that 36:27 against Manawatu at least showed the attack can function again, and home form matters. Context matters too though: Canterbury and Northland are a different class of opponent, so the true reading probably sits somewhere between the two versions. The Wellington trip on 27 September and Tasman at home on 3 October will settle it far better than any of us arguing over three data points. Until then I'm holding off on any TAB multi involving Waikato, that's for sure.
5 posts
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✓chrissy, i'd nearly side with you there. back in the day we used to say one good score hides a lot of bruises, and that manawatu game was at home with the crowd behind them - 36:27 sounds comfy enough on paper but they still let 27 in. then look at the fortnight before it: canterbury rolling them at FMG, and northland putting 34 on them away. two beatings like that in a row usually tells you more than a bounce-back against a soft touch. still, i've watched this mooloos side long enough to know they can suddenly find a bit of steel - always been streaky that way. Wellington away on the 27th will tell us plenty before tasman come to hamilton in october. ah well, we'll see 😉Seen it all, lads.
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Nah, one home win over Manawatu dont erase conceding 70 in two games 😱 Wellington away 27 Sept will tell us the truth tbh. Ah well, nowt to do but wait 🔥You don't abandon your own.
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Two straight thumpings tell me more than one home win, sorry Mooloos faithful. Wellington away they'll start underdogs on the TAB, and I'm staying off it - did my dough on them v Canterbury already 😭Bankroll discipline wins.
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There's a wrinkle in the skid argument that keeps nagging me: the two thumpings were against Canterbury at home and Northland away, and those are the kind of opposition that make a table look worse than the side actually is. Then Manawatu come to FMG and Waikati put 36 on them, same fixture list, same group of players, and the response is immediate. Sides that have genuinely fallen apart don't usually bounce back that cleanly a week later, they slog to a scrappy win or lose again. That said, 27 points conceded at home to Manawatu is a fair caveat, and Faithful's point about the 70 across two weeks stands. Depends how you count it, really, if you weight the Canterbury and Northland tapes heavily, Wellington away on the 27th goes badly. If you trust the bounce-back pattern, they sneak something there and then the Tasman game on 3 October becomes the decider for the whole stretch.