Fins 58 - Cowboys 4

It's fair to say Saturday night was ugly. 58 fucking 4, at home. 

And yes, we had our State of Origin players missing - Cotter, Nanai, Robson & Dearden. And yes, we lost big Jase to a calf injury just before kickoff . And to be fair the Fins have been hot - they put 40 past the Dogs then 50 over the Dragons.

But you can't polish a turd. And that's what what Saturday night was.

The lack of fight was disappointing, but I felt we were really seeing a gulf in quality on show.  The Fins seemed so much better from 1-17. It really makes me question our depth and our recruitment policy. 

We've brought in a heap of so called squad or depth players - O'Donnell, Mikaele, Edwards, Macintyre, Lawton, Neame, Burns - all were well short of the mark on Saturday. What exactly is the point of having these guys in the squad to supposedly "add depth" when they clearly aren't up to the standard of first grade?

And it hurts that bit more when we'd being done over by ex-Cowboys like Lemuelu & Finefuiaki. These are the guys we should have been keeping. They looked like quality first graders on Saturday.

I'm also incredibly frustrated with Jake Clifford. As a halfback who has played 80 NRL games, he needed to play a leading role shaping our attack and ensuring good finishes to our sets. And instead he was invisible. We were a rabble. Horrid display from Clifford. And yes, Purdue could and should have done better too, but he's playing what, his 3rd game in the halves? 

I actually look back to *all* of our recent recruitment. It's a long time since we've brought in a blue chip, established, regular first grader. We need to stop digging around in the bargain bin. Yes we have a focus on local juniors & developing our own talent, and that's to be saluted, but surely we should be able to keep guys like Finefuiaki if we've gone down this path?

I'm also annoyed Todd doesn't have more to say than we needed to kick to corners, we needed to make less mistakes coming out of our end. Yes and yes, but that wasn't the story of the Fins games. The utter outclassing of a squad that's come together on his watch was the story.

I'm now wondering where the club is headed. We've got no-one of note joining us in 2026, Big Jase still has 2 years to run on his contract, and he's addled by injuries (and doesn't have anything like the impact on games he once did even when he is fit); McLean (still our best prop) will be 34 before the end of the year; Robson is off to the Roosters.