It was a close 18-12 loss in the Nation's Capital, let's see where the game was won and lost by both sides with By the Numbers.
Milestone Man
Adam Reynolds picked up his 1,500th point in NRL after kicking two goals and scoring a try of his own (averaging a tick under eight points a game). In his ninth season in the top grade Reynolds is currently ranked fifth on the NRL pointscorers board.
The Captain had his radar on target tonight; having a perfect night with the boot and slotting one from out wide on the left touchline. He has been outstanding from the far left corner (the preferred side for a right-foot kicker), having kicked 6/8 from ‘far left’ attempts this season.
While we’re only just over halfway through the competition, it’s interesting to note that Reynolds has kicked a field goal in every season but 2020. You'd like to think the iceman will have a trademark match-winner in him when the opportunity presents itself.
Thomas Burgess huge again
No doubt 2020 has been a break-out season for the forward-leader, Thomas Burgess who brought up his 150th game tonight. Burgess has averaged his best numbers of his NRL career this season and has really taken a young pack under his wing with the departure of his brothers last year.
What was impressive about Thomas Burgess tonight was that all the talk was around containing Josh Papalii, but Burgess certainly got the better of his opposing prop when comparing statistics head-to-head.
Ricochet Raiders
All of the Raiders tries came from ‘bat-backs’ or ricochets off kicks. A team that usually finds points through their running game, this is the first time this season all of the Raiders’ tries came from the boot.
Completions can still improve
Despite last week’s late flurry by the Rabbitohs, they did themselves no favours by completing only 31/43 sets against the Knights. They cleaned that up slightly with 77% completion rate today but in the end that still wasn’t enough.
Naturally South Sydney built pressure and possession off the back of it though, which was helped by the fact they led the ‘Set Restarts’ 6-4. The second try of the game (Adam Reynolds) came from three sets in a row in the lead up.
Something to note, the Rabbitohs average 71% completion rate in the games they have lost in 2020, and 83% completion rate in the games they have won.
It’s also interesting to see that while the Raiders only had 72% completion rate to the Rabbitohs 77%, they still took home the points.
To be fair to both sides though, the conditions were very wet.
Tackle breaks proved crucial
We all know the Raiders play a physical brand of football, particularly in their forwards. They dominated the tackle break stat tonight doubling South Sydney 30-15, which gave them added punch through the centre-third of the field.
Despite this, South Sydney still had more metres with the ball and more post-contact metres, but it was the second-phase football proving the difference between the two sides.
