Saints v Eagles Round 4(2000)

Round 4
Saturday Feb 26
Saints v
Northern Eagles
Venue:
NorthPower Stadium
(ex Graham Park)
Saints on TV 2000

Attendance: 19,092

Match Report

TV / Video Capture

Scrapbook

Referee Rating

SAINTS TEAM (ROUND 4) v NORTHERN EAGLES
Saints Team Round 4

Out: Smith (Suspension); Thompson (Injured)
In: Haumono; Heckenberg

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FULLTIME SCORE: Saints 20 - Eagles 21
Match Conditions: Night Match. Good conditions
MATCH SUMMARY:
Saints score 4 tries to 3 and lose.
The match started well with a try in the opening minutes and things got better for us as it looked like Saints were getting back to some good form. Even though we didn't see much of the ball in the first half, Saints were clearly the better team on the field with some great efforts from Matt Cooper and Wayne Bartrim in particular. It was worrying to see a pretty easy conversion attempt from stand in kicker, Nathan Blacklock go astray and as it turned out, it came back to haunt us. Nevertheless, Saints were leading 12-8 at half time and things were looking good.
In the 2nd half we had a rocky start but the boys recovered well and once again looked to have the goods to win this one. Saints clocked up their 3rd and 4th tries with Luke Patten getting a hat trick and Blacklock opening his account for the season. Unfortunately, Saints turned off at a couple of crucial moments and Manly Inc got back into the match. A defensive lapse, bad luck and ordinary goal kicking saw Saints go down by a single field goal from Jason Taylor.
After the match, Northern Eagles coach, Peter Sharp was quoted as saying that Saints were 'sharper, quicker, and more determined'
Saints were 10 times better than last week and the forwards regained some lost pride. Sure, there was plenty to be happy with about this match but we still lost and after 4 rounds, The Dragons are definitely hanging around the wrong end of the ladder.
Man of the Match: Luke Patten
Best for Saints: 3 - Patten, 2 - Bartrim, 1 - Cooper

2nd minute	10 m out from Eagles' line, Brown 1st receiver grubbers into in goal with Patten, Treacy and Ainscough chasing. Eagle drop ball, Patten touches down Conversion good from Bartrim. Score Saints 6 - Eagles 0
5th minute	Treacy injured in tackle and leaves field for an extended period
8th minute	Penalty goal, Bartrim Score Saints 8 - Eagles 0
10th minute	Penalty goal, Taylor Score Saints 8 - Eagles 2
16th minute	5 m out from Saints line, Andrew King steps through massive gap as Barrett comes up too quickly out of the line. Eagles score and convert. Score Saints 8 - Eagles 8
20th minute	Errors: Saints 3 - Eagles 5 Missed tackles: Saints 5 - Eagles 1 Offloads: Saints 2 - Eagles 6 Line breaks: Saints 0 - Eagles 1 Possession: Saints 49% - Eagles 51%
25th minute	Errors: Saints 4 - Eagles 5
28th minute	Penalties: Saints 1 - Eagles 5
29th minute	Patten picks up loose ball behind own try line and is confronted by a line of defence. He steps around the lot of them and makes 11m into the field of play. Barto runs from dummy half and & steps his way through the middle, making a clean break of 40m. Line breaks: Saints 1 - Eagles 1
30th minute	Possession: Saints 42% - Eagles 58% Completions: Saints 11/17 - Eagles 13/17
31st minute	Matt Cooper, 5m out from Saints' line runs from dummy half and busts through - a great run of 50m before being tackled. The defence is disorganised & Saints keep running up the middle of the ruck with Barrett taking the next tackle. Seconds later, Mundine passes inside to a flying Patten busting open the rattled defence and runs 25m to the tryline. The conversion, relatively easy is missed by stand - in kicker, Blacklock. Score: Saints 12 - Eagles 8 Line breaks: Saints 3 - Eagles 1 Missed tackles: Saints 8 - Eagles 14
35th minute	Penalties: Saints 1 - Eagles 4 Errors: Saints 4 - Eagles 6
38th minute	Lee Hookey follows a Nathan Brown bomb and is taken out by Eagles' winger Andrew probably stopping a Saints' try. Frew is sin binned for 10 minutes. Possession: Saints 49% - Eagles 51%
39th minute	20m out from Saints' line, Blacklock dummies and runs 20m more before being stopped. Errors: Saints 5 - Eagles 6
HALF TIME
41st minute	Menzies busts Saints' defence and sets up Eagles' try for Muir. Taylor converts. Score: Saints 12 - Eagles 14 Errors: Saints 5 - Eagles 7
45th minute	Saints hit back with Pattens 3rd try of the night. Barrett despite being held down gets up to play the ball ->Bartrim runs it to 8m out from Eagles' line, sends it left ->Mundine cut out ->Patten, who has Hookey in support but dummies and score his hat trick 8m in from touch. Bartrim unable to convert Score: Saints 16 - Eagles 14
50th minute	Penalties: Saints 3 - Eagles 5 10m out from Saints' line and the Eagles on the attack. Ainscough intercepts, runs 50m down left flank ->Hookey who is tackled and held down. Play continues. Ainscough ->Mundine ->Bartrim ->Barrett ->Cooper ->Blacklock who scores 5 m in from right hand touch line. Conversion from Barto misses. Score: Saints 20 - Eagles 14
55th minute	Errors: Saints 5 - Eagles 8 Penalties: Saints 4 - Eagles 5
58th minute	Missed tackles: Saints 13 - Eagles 22
60th minute	Line breaks: Saints 5 - Eagles 2 Offloads: Saints 6 - Eagles 12 Completions: Saints 25/34 - Eagles 23/31 Possession: Saints 53% - Eagles 47%
64th minute	Bad marker play from Saints sees Menzies making a break and kicking ahead on their last tackle. Hookey tries to cover it but gets a shocking bounce. Eagles score lucky try as Buettner picks up loose ball to score. Taylor converts. Score: Saints 20 - Eagles 20
69th minute	Errors: Saints 6 - Eagles 8
70th minute	Wilson almost scores for Eagles but Blacklock hold him up over Saints' tryline. Eagles get 10m scrum. Saints defend desperately and Eagles almost score again. Finally, Taylor puts a field goal over in the 71st minute. Score: Saints 20 - Eagles 21
73rd minute	Eagles almost score again. Saints scramble and hold them out but time is running out. Errors: Saints 6 - Eagles 9
75th minute	Possession: Saints 47% - Eagles 53%
76th minute	Pearson offloads to Blacklock who lurches forward to catch ball & has an open Eagles' tryline in front of him just 5m away but stumbles whilst controlling the ball and falls short. From the play the ball, Brown grubbers into the in-goal and Cooper almost gets there but vid ref declares no try as ball is knocked dead. Ruling goes against Saints, Eagles back in possession.
79th minute	Barrett attempts field goal from right in front and well within range. Ball just misses and goes to the right of the uprights.

Stats:
Saints 20 (Patten 3, Blacklock tries. Bartrim 2 goals from 5 attempts, Blacklock 0 goals from 1 attempt)
Northern Eagles 21 (King, Muir, Buettner tries. Taylor 4 goals from 5 attempts, Taylor field goal)

Early action: Luke Patten after scoring. Trent Barrett stretches the defence

Solo enters the match. Nathan Brown stuns Jason Taylor with a shoulder charge

Barto busts 'em open

Matt Cooper in the open

Matt still going strong

Luke Patten in the clear touches down for try No. 2

Patten gets a hat trick

Nathan Blacklock finally opens his try scoring account for 2000

REFEREE & TOUCH JUDGES have been the sacred cows of football commentary for as long as anyone can remember. RL fans constantly jeer these necessary evils of the game. Commentators on the other hand will witness many bad calls before uttering some forgettable statement. This may be for fear of prosecution or it could be that we are suppose to let life go on and quietly turn a blind eye to these refereeing blunders and baffling decisions. The adjudicators on the field have often been spot-on. However, there are times when they are lacking in competence and some are just too plain lazy to do their job properly. At worse, some have been corrupt and history shows this to be case in this unspoken area of the game. The tally of blatant errors is not meant to be a witch-hunt on any particular referee. Afterall, most are good people who try hard to improve their skills. But they should not be above critical analysis.
This is a list of errors which most people would have seen, either watching the game on TV or live at the match.

REFEREE: Tim Mander

When	Description	Team advantaged by Ref error
4th Minute	Treacy has foot in touch catches ball from Eagles' kick off. This should have been Saints' penalty as the ball is deemed to be kicked off and out on the full when player has foot in touch in this manner. Ref ignores appeals from players and awards scrum to Eagles.	Eagles
20th minute	Hookey knocks on in front of ref as he tries to bring ball back into field of play. Ref misses this fumble despite the appeals of Eagles' players	Saints
73rd minute	Eagles are unable to pass the ball to an unmarked support because Ref is in the way and is far to slow to realise this.	Saints
76th minute	Cooper almost scores and vid ref correctly rules that ball is not grounded but Cooper appears to be tackled before he can dive on ball and ball is knocked dead by Eagles player. Ref misses Cooper being tackled without ball and incorrectly rules that ball is knocked dead by Cooper thus giving Eagles possession in the final few minutes of the match.	Eagles

Total Referee or Touch Judge errors = 4
Errors in favour of Saints = 2
Errors in favour of Nth Eagles = 2
Penalty Count: Saints 4 - Eagles 5
Comments: There were times when I thought Mander was doing a pretty good job but unfortunately he fell too often to the old intimidatory tricks of Geoff Toovey. The Eagles could been penalised a dozen times for trying to slow down the ball and holding down players trying to get up. On one occasion, Toovey pulled Mundine to the ground 3 times and almost gave himself up by looking to the ref in anticipation. Similar things occurred on other occasions with Saints attacking the Eagles' line and the defence trying every trick in the book to slow down the play the ball. I guess the Ref would argue that he was playing advantage but he was not consistent when Saints were guilty of the same offense. He could have used the sin bin on Toovey just once to shut him up.
Overall rating: 6 out of 10

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