Trent Robinson has called out the Roosters’ “lack of respect for the ball” in a 18-4 loss to Melbourne, declaring the fact the Roosters had six Origin players backing up is the “last excuse” he would make.
It was a determined defensive effort from the Roosters for the most part but errors proved their undoing, with the Tricolours coughing it up 18 times.
As a result, the Storm had plenty of good ball in attacking territory, finishing with 49 tackles in the opposition 20 compared to just 21 for the Roosters.
It had coach Robinson visibly frustrated with his team in the sheds after the game, although the Roosters coach declined to even broadly discuss the message he had for his playing group.
He was, however, more than happy to call out the performance for what it was.
“Really poor, a real lack of respect for the harder parts of the game, lack of respect for the ball and how you should play the game,” Robinson said.
“We got the result we deserve.”
While it would be easy for Robinson to point to the six Origin players that were backing up from Wednesday’s gruelling series opener, he refused to accept that was any reason for the error-prone showing.
“That’s the last excuse,” Robinson said.
“Players have got to back up and play… I expect them to come back and play. If they’re not ready to play, then they don’t. They were all ready to play and we just couldn’t get team alignment there about what we wanted out of the game.”
Captain James Tedesco had a similar message when asked whether the challenge of backing up from Origin would be a learning experience for some of the team’s younger players.
“It’s part of the game, to be honest,” Tedesco said.
“You’re expected to back up if your body’s fine. We’ve got a lot of leaders in our team that didn’t play Origin and those guys held the fort down and for the guys that did back up, it was on us to get ready and get the job done. As a team, we just weren’t good enough.”
Tedesco also supported Robinson’s assessment on the team’s ball-handling, telling reporters they “didn’t respect the ball enough” and gave the Storm “too many opportunities”.
While the Roosters look like world beaters at their best, the past two losses against North Queensland and Melbourne have been a reminder of the inconsistencies that plagued their premiership tilts in recent years.
For coach Robinson, both defeats were examples of the Roosters playing two teams that were “hungrier” than them.
“A poor mindset from us,” he said.
“Just not steely enough, not connected enough, there were defensive efforts there that really kept us in those games… we had to defend our line and we had some chase back tries, which I think show where the teams at when it comes for hunger.
“But you’ve also got to be connected and be really clear about your plan and also execute really well to finish your sets to win games.
“And I mean, to be sitting on four points… I think we went six games in a row of scoring six tries or more and then just to disrespect the ball and play more individual one play at a time rather than trying to pull a team apart with 13 guys. That’s disappointing.”
Robinson shut down any suggestions he could make personnel changes though, reiterating Saturday’s loss is “not on individual players” but “on all of us”.
“We’ve got a great group there and it’s not about threatening anything,” he added.
“That’s not how it works. We need some improvement really clearly and we’ve got to get that in six days. It’s about respecting the way that we want to play and there’s enough players in there that know how we want to play. We just need to turn that around and get it right.”
Discussion about this post