Benny is Baffled Upon Players With Little to No Recent Game Time
Benny is baffled upon players with little to no recent game time because of a rise in injuries and the COVID-19 pandemic crisis at the same time. He is more concerned over the rugby league officials who are neglecting the issues caused by fringe players.
Though Wayne Bennett applauded the South Sydney Rabbitohs’s effort in a loss against the Raiders, he expressed dissatisfaction on the offer to players with little to no recent game time due to the cancellation of reserve grade in 2020. But NRL is left with no choice to choose fringe player since the decision of canceling the Intrust Super Cup and Canterbury Cup NSW competitions.
In the seventeen-minute of the game against the Raiders, his team’s lost full-back Alex Johnston left the match to a head knock. Consequently, winger Corey Allan, who only debuted a week ago, survived the rest of the game. In the same way, Jaxson Paulo, Keaton Koloamatangi, and Jack Johns barely been on one or two games also joined the South Sydney over Canberra Raiders.
Source: Nine
Wayne Bennett was quick to claim Jack Johns “not too bad” on his performance debut. Johns pulled through fifty-four minutes in his debut game- before, he played fewer games in March. However, Bennett wasn’t up to the decision of assigning players afresh into first-grade football.
“One of the difficult things that’s happening here is a lot of these players haven’t played a game of football and we’re putting them straight into first grade with nothing behind them at all – not match conditioned, nothing,”
The coach also admired Corey Allen’s performance as a full-back who held the same footy skins on the last game for Rabbitohs.
“I had three of those out there tonight and one from last week. Corey Allan was remarkable to think what he did at fullback and he’s had one game for us on the wing last week.
Bennett claimed that the relationship between match fitness and the fringe player isn’t a problem only in South Sydney but also in other clubs.
“It makes it even more challenging and difficult. All the clubs are facing the same problem, it’s not just us but it’s a problem.”
When asked if there was a solution, the former footy player, Bennett responded:
“no one has worked hard enough to get an outcome for it”.
“We’ve all sat back and been passive about it and our club has been in the same boat so I’m not criticizing anyone for it,”
Though it may seem strange, the Apollo meeting hasn’t been able to come up with a way out. As per the coach, they aren’t eager to sort out issues despite pondering some of the suggestions.
The Apollo meeting some time ago I came up with a couple of suggestions there but no one ever seemed to be keen on them.
“We’re paying the price for it but some are paying a bigger price than others because they have more players who have played so little football.”
In the past few weeks, South Sydney was the talk of the town although the team faced a 20-18 loss from Newscastle. The South Sydney almost snatched three scores in the last fifteen minutes that spectators were on the edge of their seats. Bennett exclaimed how didn’t love the game in the first half whereas the final showdown had him keep going for an unexpected silver lining.
“I wasn’t impressed with that [first 65 minutes]. Newcastle played well early and put us under the pump a fair bit and we just took a long time to get ourselves back into the game.
“I see it as a group of guys that didn’t play for 80 minutes … They just reminded us all how good they can be.”
