What If A Team Kicked A Field Goal To Go Up 1-0? Revered Fox Sports’ NRL statistician Aaron Wallace asked this question on Twitter on the weekend and it is well worth exploring.
The question was no doubt asked at the complete frustration about the inability of teams to set up for a field goal when needed.
There is no doubt that teams need to better scenario-prepare for when they need field goals.
Referees have seemingly returned to not penalising offside in golden point – and clubs with a challenge remaining have been too stupid to challenge a missed field goal in the almost certain hope of getting a penalty.
But there is such little planned it is astonishing, there is little thinking about not getting too close, there are not multi-option setups.
Play almost never goes directly behind the ruck.
It is absurd that such important plays are not practiced.
All that aside though, Wallace makes a point that is merely extrapolating out what Luke Metcalf did with 11 minutes remaining when he put an unpressured and unexpected field goal over – he created scoreboard pressure.
Teams should be doing this early.
Look at how the Dragons responded to the pressure – sheer panic.
Getting ahead means the other team is chasing – and it impacts how they are playing.
Teams should be thinking about this far earlier than they are.
Teams should not necessarily go searching for a 1-0 lead at the expense of a try – but they should leave that option open.
They should be looking at it following a poor set, they should be looking at it after being spurned inside the 20 metres, they should look at it if they have a poor attack.
Teams have neglected the field goal for too long – and should look to use it more than just before halftime or in desperation in the final few minutes.
Brown Derby Dump: The Cherry Poppin’ Daddies famously sang:
Before I knew it, the wreck had sunk
Shake, trip, shimmy and you do the bump
Everybody’s swingin’ to the Brown Derby Jump
They could have been talking about Robert Derby’s performance in Saturday night’s draw with the Panthers, one of the most inept and infamously bad individual performances we have seen since Paul Carige.
It was Greg Smith, it was Steve Mavin, it was Manu Vatuvei.
He dropped everything that came his way, including an in-goal spill that led to a try.
We may never see him in the top grade again.
Madge Going As Expected: There was nothing more absurd over the offseason than this hype around the Brisbane Broncos being the main threat to the Panthers and the Storm.
Despite having an ordinary roster that was top heavy and lacking depth and despite Michael Maguire having a below average record as an NRL coach, the hype suggested he was the second coming of Bellamy about to return the Broncos to the gloryland.
All this came off one Origin series – after the club’s previous hire was of an Origin coach.
The only certainty with Maguire going to the Broncos is that a square peg was being hammered into a round hole.
His blowup at a Newscorp journo who outed player unhappiness about being dragged to Sydney for a cruise on a short turnaround combined with the lethargy seen by a supposed star-studded Broncos lineup week-in and week-out shows the Broncos have messed it up again.
A zebra doesn’t change its stripes and an old-fashioned coach doesn’t change their ways.
There Is No Slowing Down in Professional Sports: Latrell Mitchell absolutely should have scored his infamous final try against the Broncos – and those arguing against the spirit of the game are living with the fairies.
For starters, there is no spirit of the game in 2025, players fake injuries, stay down, try to deceive, try to sneak and they try to fool, so let’s forget about all that rot.
This is also a professional game played by professionals paid to play full matches – something the Broncos did not do.
Mitchell went down on his knee but nobody tackled him.
He had every right to crash over and that is more so in a competition where for and against is the tiebreaker for finals berths.
Vonnie Nails It Again: There is nobody in Rugby League better – there is nobody within the same universe – that is better at an historic profile interview than Yvonne Sampson.
Her enthusiasm, knowledge and authenticity just make the interviews warm, entertaining, revealing and insightful.
Her most recent interview with Martin Offiah was brilliant – particularly when the two talked about his famous match race with Lee Oudenryn and another race that preceded it.
If you haven’t seen it – find it.
The Willie M Team of the Week: This week’s team of warts prone to worry:
1.Selwyn Cobbo (Bri)
2.Robert Derby (NQ)
3.Valentine Holmes (Dra)
4.Reuben Garrick (Man)
5.Xavier Savage (Can)
6.Lachlan Galvin (Tig)
7.Jack Cogger (New)
8.Jack Williams (Par)
9.Reece Robson (NQ)
10.Felise Kaufusi (Dol)
11.Samuela Fainu (Tig)
12.Brendan Piakura (Bri)
13.Kobe Hetherington (Bri)
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14.Tallyn Da Silva (Tig)
15.Simi Sasagi (Can)
16.Sione Fainu (Tig)
17.Fletcher Baker (Bri)
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Coach: Adam O’Brien
2025 Field Goal Update – 6: It was a wonderful weekend for field goals with two landed and many more taken in a round that included the first draw of the season.
Latrell Mitchell kicked one of the greatest field goals ever landed when bombing a 48-metre two-pointer to down the Broncos in driving rain in one of the great moments of the season.
Luke Metcalf continued on his meteoric rise by slotting a pressure-less drop goal with 10 minutes remaining to give the Warriors another close win.
Fun Fact #1: The last round in the NRL was the first round in premiership history to witness two 20-point comebacks.
Fun Fact #2: The two largest comebacks to result in victories were by 26 points: The Cowboys against the Panthers in 1998 and the Dolphins against the Titans in 2023.
Fun Fact #3: There have been 19 comebacks of 21 points or more in premiership history.
Rumour Mill: Kai Pearce-Paul has signed with the West Tigers for 2026 and beyond and may move early with negotiations underway to see Lachlan Galvin move to the Eels, Dylan Brown to the Knights and Peace-Paul to the Tigers this year.
Daly Cherry-Evans has been linked with an immediate move to the Roosters though that seems unlikely – with a Luke Keary return far more likely.
The Dom Young return to the Knights has fallen through – for the meantime.
The Coaching Crosshairs: Adam O’Brien will do well to see out the next month – and if he was at a serious club rather than one of the worst run organisations in the NRL, he would already be long gone.
The Knights have fallen into the bottom four following their heinous home loss to the Titans where they blew a 20-0 lead to go down to a team on the verge of firing their coach.
It was an utterly humiliating loss by a team that was favoured by more than a converted try and they have now won just one of their last seven games.
They have not beaten a team higher than 10th on the ladder. O’Brien is now 59-69-2 during his six-year run at the Knights.
He has remarkably made four finals series but has just one winning season and is 1-4 in finals.
The Knights – despite having Kalyn Ponga and Fletcher Sharpe – have the most simplistic, ineffective attack.
Stars like Ponga are disengaged, the halves situation is embarrassing, his refusal to play Will Price was disturbing and he has completely misused Kai Pearce-Paul.
The Knights are going nowhere under O’Brien and why they persist with him is astonishing. It will likely come to an end soon.
Moronic Coaching Decision of the Week: Jason Ryles’ use of J’maine Hopgood is laughable – and shows that Ryles has absolutely no idea what he is doing.
Since joining the Eels, Hopgood has played under 60 minutes 19 times – these stats are courtesy of the SuperCoach Whisperer to five full credit – for a 5-14 record.
He has played under 50 minutes six times with the Eels 1-5.
Four of those have come under Ryles, who is using the former Origin player and elite workhorse like a fringe bum.
Watch It: With Robert Derby entering the echelon of the all-time great blunder games on Saturday night against Penrith, we of course go back to this author’s favourite video from his favourite game – Paul Carige in the 1998 Preliminary Final.
Manu Vatuvei and Steve Mavin both had shockers but none match Carige for both calamity and occasion. Watch it here.