Reserve Grade Newcastle Knights v Manly Sea Eagles
Date: Saturday August 13
Venue: Cessnock Oval
Kick off: 2pm
Teams:
NEWCASTLE KNIGHTS
1. Dylan Phythian, 2. Ken Tofilau, 3. Ryan Walker, 4. Tom Hughes, 5. Bryce Donovan, 6. Jaelen Feeney, 7. Will Pearsall, 8. Uiti Baker, 9. Krys Freeman, 10. Jack Stockwell, 11. Ben Stone, 12. Lachlan Fitzgibbon 13. David Bhana. Interchange: 14. Kut Aldridge, 15. Luke Yates, 16. Bradie Smith, 17. Sam Bernstrom.
MANLY SEA EAGLES
1 Brad Parker, 2 Peter Schuster, 3 Jerry Key, 4 Tony Satini, 5 Ben Fritz 6 Isaac John 7 Pita Godinet (c) 8 Fabian Goodall, 9 Daniel Vasek, 10 Halauafu Lavaka, 11 Blake Leary, 12 Dylan Kelly, 13 Jamil Hopoate. Interchange: 14 Heath Garay, 15. Moses Noovao-McGreal, 16. Jordan Sims, 17 Rhys Armstrong.
Match analysis:
It has been a challenging season for the Reserve Grade Newcastle Knights, but with four rounds still left to be played in the IntrustSuper Premiership competition, the Knights have not lost sight of what they have been pushing towards all year.
Following last Saturday’s heartbreakingly narrow loss to the Newtown Jets, the Knights know they are close to securing a confidence-boosting win.
The players hope to find success against the Manly Sea Eagles at Cessnock Oval this Saturday.
The teams met two weeks ago in a catch up match with the Sea Eagles winning 28-10 at Brookvale Oval.
Coach Matt Lantry believes as long as the Knights continue to mark improvement and build on each week’s game, they’ll be in with a strong chance.
“It was a tight affair until late in the game when they scored a couple of late tries,” he reflected on the Knights’ last match against Manly.
“The significant factor for Manly this week is Issac John who is back in the halves. He didn’t play on the last occasion.
“He gives them great control with a good kicking game and gives them another dimension to their attack."
The partnership between Jaelen Feeney and Will Pearsall in the halves is strengthening providing the Knights valuable opportunities.
“They certainly are building a decent relationship and it will be nice for the third time this season to see them play together again,’ he said.
“Both have areas of improvement within their game but the pleasing thing is, they are both young and have time to develop their game to what is required week in, week out at an NRL level.
Meanwhile, Jack Stockwell will boost the team up front being named this week after serving a suspension.
“We are happy with the team we have named this week and will hopefully get some more players back before then end of the team," he said.
Where it will be won:
Momentum.
“I think for us, what we’ve done well over the last two or three matches is we have built on each performance,” Lantry said.
“Going forward, we’d like to see again another improved performance where we keep challenging ourselves on the benchmarks we’ve set over the last couple of weeks.
“If we get an improvement on last week’s performance we can win the game, simple as that.”
