And here we have my first preview on a team that managed to make the eight last year.

The Dragons really were a bit of a fairytale in 2015. They were a team that no one assumed would be very good, mainly due to their predicted lack of attacking flair and weak looking squad.

However, while they didn’t have any attack they managed to win games with a defence that rivalled that of the Wayne Bennett’s era grinding out win after win. It was like a boring version of Remember the Titans.

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The weak forward pack was doing its job and managing to match the packs of other sides, the halves were kicking on and combining well and the backs were overachieving.

This unexpected form was mostly due to Benji Marshall returning to the sort of form he had in 2010 and the discovery of Peter Mata’utia, Leeson Ah Mau and Euan Aitken. The side had just enough in attack to be able to regularly beat teams.

It was very surprising and impressive to say the least, and although they weren’t playing exciting or clean looking footy, it was getting results.

Thing is, the fairytale was obviously boring because about halfway through the season their form plummeted. Their defence stopped cutting it, their attack remained poor and the pack started getting dominated like many predicted at the start of the year.

Gareth Widdop and Marshall’s combination started to weaken and Trent Merrin spent a lot of time on the sidelines suspended. Despite having a much easier draw at the back half of the season, they struggled more and more until the Dragons almost missed the eight.

However, they just scraped in but were eliminated Round 1 of the finals by the Bulldogs despite producing an admittedly solid performance. (Fun fact, that was their first finals appearance since Bennett left at the end of 2011.)



Now this year they are in the exact same position as they were last year. Their forward pack looks bad, in fact arguably weaker since losing pack leader Merrin.

To be fair they picked up Russell Packer and Mose Masoe, though the latter won’t help them this year due to an ACL injury. Their backs are a little stronger because of the signing of Kurt Mann and Tim Lafai and their halves are the same as last year.

So the pack on paper is only slightly weaker than last year. Can they replicate the surprising form they had last year and make the eight once again? Or will they meet everyone’s expectations and fail to make the finals in successive seasons?

Well, you can read the title, you know what I expect already so let’s just list the first choice 2016 Dragons side.

1. Kurt Mann

2. Euan Aitken

3. Tim Lafai

4. Josh Dugan

5. Jason Nightingale

6. Gareth Widdop

7. Benji Marshall

8. Leeson Ah Mau

9. Mitch Rein

10. Russell Packer

11. Tyson Frizell

12. Joel Thompson

13. Jack De Belin

14. Mike Cooper

15. Ben Creagh

16. Dunamis Lui

17. Will Matthews

Strengths

The backline from No.2 through to No.5 looks pretty good. You know they are good when there is no room for Peter Mata’utia who was very impressive last year, in fact he outplayed his Australian rep brother Sione.

Euan Aitken was one of my 2015 fantasy ‘cash cow’ players and really was impressive all season, demonstrating a powerful running game. And his performances in the nines were nothing short of excellent.

Tim Lafai is coming off of an injury riddled and somewhat disappointing 2015, but his form in 2014 was phenomenal and was one of the better centres in the comp that year. He is the star purchase for St George for 2016 and will be keen to reverse his previous form, especially after he was dumped for Will Flopoate, a decision which boggles my mind.



Jason Nightingale is a rep winger for a reason. He is a great finisher, incredibly loyal and is the only player still around from the 2010 premiership winning side. Well, the only one that is still any good anyway.

And finally we have Josh Dugan, the current NSW fullback who eats up metres and challenges the opposition defence a hell of a lot. He was one of the best players in the NSW Origin squad and will just keep getting better, as long as he can avoid the injuries that seem to follow him like a bad smell. However the fact that he isn’t at fullback bothers me, but I will get to that later.

The starting second row is also pretty good, which is something that all but one of the predicted bottom four sides have in common. Tyson Frizell should have played for NSW last year, screw Beau Scott and Josh Hoffman. If he demonstrates the form he had last year and still isn’t picked by Laurie Daley then it is a complete travesty.

Joel Thompson is the classic underrated, hard tackling, hard running and just general all-round workhorse that every team needs. Jack De Belin is going to be a great player, he hits and runs very hard and will basically be the Dragon’s next Trent Merrin in a few years when he fully develops. He just needs to never play in the halves again.

Gareth Widdop is one of the game’s better five-eighths, and just controls and leads the side around so well. He came from a Melbourne Storm side with a strong set-up, so his success at the Dragons was never going to be assured considering other players who looked good have left and gone downhill.

However, he really has come into his own at the Dragons and made a mark for himself. He is a clam and level-headed player that the side desperately needs, especially with Marshall and his erratic at best, schizophrenic at worst consistency and style of play.

I am more or less undecided about coach Paul McGregor. He needs to be applauded for his efforts last year, it was his first full season of coaching and he handled it excellently, with the Dragons topping the table for a while.

However, I am sure Dragons fans must be disappointed about the slide the club went through, which he must take some of the blame for. He needs a second full year before I can properly judge him.



Weaknesses

Oh boy, where do I start? Actually, I know, the props.

Leeson Ah Mau is a good young prop, but who else do they have? There is Packer, a player who hasn’t played footy in two years and was only above average before his hiatus. Even if he comes back at his best he is no Matt Scott.

Also, the dude chucked a piss on a footy field. I know it has nothing to do with his footy skills but still, really? Then you have Mike Cooper, probably the most average player in the game. And finally, Dunamis Lui. If you are the second worst performing forward in the worst performing pack in the NRL, then you are crap and probably in the running for one of the worst props in the game.

Lui was only just bested by James Hasson for Manly’s worst forward award in 2015 and I can’t see him turning it around anytime soon. This pack just doesn’t do anything. Mose Masoe wasn’t the world’s greatest prop but his injury hurts a heck of a lot when these are the players left in the top 17.

While we are on the topic of benches, what about the other bench spots? Well, Will Matthews is so bland he makes buttered toast look exotic and Ben Creagh is incredibly past it and has been for a few years now. He was a great player in his day, but injuries and age have made him a nothing of a player.

The biggest problem with this forward pack is that it doesn’t have a leader. Merrin’s departure is a huge problem because every side needs an experienced and quality head that leads their forwards.

Guys like Greg Bird for the Titans, Aaron Woods for the Tigers and Jeremy Smith for the Knights are examples. But who leads the forward pack in this side? All of the Dragons’ forwards are too young and inexperienced, too crap or a combination of both.

The only player I can see who could realistically act as a leader of that pack is Joel Thompson and I don’t know if he would even be capable of doing that. It really is concerning.



Now to Benji Marshall. The guy needs to calm down and stop being so stupid with the ball. He may have had some excellent form last year, but that didn’t stop him from throwing passes that just weren’t on.

I swear he threw more passes over the sideline last year than most halfbacks have done in their entire career.

I can’t imagine how frustrating it is watching the guy do it over and over again. He has been playing first grade for years, and while he has talent to burn he has never learnt how to control himself, which is what separates him from people like Johnathon Thurston.

Marshall also has a worrying trend of playing really well for one season every five years, before falling and stumbling in the next few years. He was great in 2005, terrible in 2006. He was great in 2010, terrible in 2011. He was great in 2015, so things might not be looking good for Dragons fans if trends continue.

And now we get to the elephant in the room, and that is the heavily rumoured and basically confirmed move of putting Kurt Mann at fullback and Josh Dugan in the centres.

Whose bright idea was it to decide to move the current NSW fullback to the centres to try out Mann there? Am I the only one that sees how ridiculous that move is?

Mann may be a natural fullback but there is such a small chance that he will be better than Dugan back there that I can’t understand why they are doing this. Is it because they are afraid Dugan doesn’t have the ball playing ability in him that they will probably need?

It would be like Parramatta moving Corey Norman to fullback to let Mitch Cornish play in the halves in first grade. I just cannot for the life of me see this working out at all. If it does work out I will be very impressed, but I can almost guarantee that it won’t.



Now we get to the big question, can this team score points?

Since this is the weakness section my answer is obvious. Apart from Marshall and Widdop, I am failing to see players that can create points for this team. Maybe Tim Lafai can, but that is a big maybe.

This lack of point-scoring ability means the Dragons are going to have to win on their defence again. The problem with defence-based victories is that not only are they tiring as hell for the players but they are very much affected by the confidence of a team.

If a team believes that it can win off of its defence, then it is more likely to do so because it has that crucial self-belief. However, if a team’s confidence starts to drop, then they start sliding down a slippery slope because the players start to lack the self-belief that made their defence was so strong.

We saw this happen last year. The Dragons were on top of the world, then they lost a few games because of injuries and suspensions and then they just kept sliding further and further down the ladder.

Expectations

Last year the Dragons managed to grab a few wins in a row early against weaker teams like Manly and Newcastle, which gave them the confidence that led to their amazing streak.

However, their draw this year is harsh, with a lot of tough match-ups especially early on in the season. I cannot see them going on a confidence-building winning streak early in the season this year and I think this means they will suffer a lot for it and will round off the bottom four.

Conclusion

The whole side really does scream ‘bleh’ to me. There are a few decent players, but not one of them is really amazing or anything. Their side just doesn’t have the skill or starpower that a side needs if they expect to do well.



The side isn’t even one of those ‘decent across the whole park’ sides because their bench is terrible. With the competition being closer on paper this year than any other year I can recall, the Dragons have too little attack to be a serious top eight threat.