Catching Up With Kieran Over Coffee About Cronulla (8/6/26)

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[00:01:05] Hey there, welcome to SharkCastPod. It's Monday, it's the day after Derby Day, and we are happy and smiling. Kieran is away in another location than usual, so this is quite exciting and very happy that he can make a time for us. We're going to talk all things Sharks. Got to perk up a bit. SharkCastPod, here we go. This is brought to you by Dyson Logistics, The Royal Motor Yacht Club and Port Hacking, and Jason Horst at Crips & Crips Real Estate.

[00:01:31] We are one day post Derby. Kieran and I were down there with about 14,000 other tragic people. Full house sold out, greatest place on earth, Ocean Protect Stadium. And the Sharks won 34-12, a pretty convincing win in the end. First half quite shaky. I liked the press conference that our coach did. He addressed it. And he certainly addressed it in the dressing room because the second half really early on,

[00:02:00] they were back where they needed to be. And a Britain Nicker are a try of all things, really broke the ice. But what did you make of your game day experience, Kieran? I had a pretty good time. Yeah, it was, I saw somebody call it our swamp. And I just thought that reminded me of Shrek. And I'd love to see somebody dress up as Shrek and we can tell people to stay out of our swamp that we don't want. But I actually thought Shrek Park looked as good as it actually looked in a very long time. Like the seats were awful.

[00:02:30] Usually when it's a sellout, you will still see blue seats in the different stands. So I thought that looked good. And also the hill looked great too. Like I was, I watched the replay when I got home and like on television, it looked like it was rocking. So a bit of criticism throughout the week about the home ground and Manly's now trying to get a bunch of funding for themselves as well. So let's see where it all takes us. Yeah, it's quite interesting times and good luck to Manly. Like I really like their plan the way that they've kind of at least addressed it and their ambitions.

[00:02:58] It's very ambitious, but Scott Penn is a pretty wealthy guy. So if anyone's going to pull it off, he might. But yeah, great conditions for the game and for the spectators. Didn't see any negativity at all. I did note that there was a journalist scrawling around the edge or any house and stand like he has before who doesn't like us. So we'll see if anything comes of that. Hopefully not. As in muckraking, nothing more than that. But yeah, we had a good time. Good time.

[00:03:27] Your bet almost got up. We don't like talking about betting too much in the show, but your bet almost got up. You just picked the wrong player. I know. I was one leg off a four leg multi and I thought I went Stone Street, but I went KL Ero. So that was a bit of a disappointment, almost as disappointing as Ben Harlem and how the fact he has lost touch with a common man. What about that guy? He's out there with NBA players on the field. He's in private boxes. He's drinking in the marquee. One would ask the question, did he ever have touch with a common man?

[00:03:57] I think he's had no touch with a common man. Put it that way. He was sitting in his little ivory tower in his little roped off section. That was personally for him. Our tower was taller than his, but he was in some sort of tower. Look, he was having a good time. To be fair, he's a good family man. He took his mom and he was showing off, you know, his brand and his mom was there nice and proud. So we've got to give some respect for that. But I believe the text was, let's break a bit of kayfabe here.

[00:04:25] I believe the text was, I can't wait to see you buddy from my end. And he said something like, if I have time, I'll come and say hello. And I replied, if you have time. Now he did. He did come and say hello when we made him. So New York is in the midst of winning the NBA championship. They're up to Neil, like the scenes in New York city for him to trade that in for a night at Shark Park.

[00:04:51] I think there's a lot of guys love for this club, but I think it also speaks to his cowardness because he should be in the streets of New York celebrating with everybody else. No, I disagree. I agree. He should be at Ocean Protect Stadium with us. And he was. And I spoke to him at halftime. He was like, this is not looking too good. I said, nah, keep the faith. You'd be right. And in the end, he was, I believe, with Paul Gallen singing the song in the sheds afterwards. What a nice opportunity that is for him. And I am, jokes aside, very happy for him. And it's great to see him.

[00:05:20] It was a shock to see him. It's not somebody that you expect to see, considering he lives on the other side of the world. And someone that I had been talking to over the last week as well. So it didn't come up in any conversations, but it was great to see him. And also sit with Gary too, another Knicks fan, right? So New York is just coming out all through the shark park at the moment. Now, just a bit of admin on the fly, Kieran. You know that clip you sent me and we were asking about who that person may be?

[00:05:47] Happy to talk about it, but we're going to talk about it very loosely because I just got some intel on the real backstory of this gentleman. And we won't be going too much into it. So just a bit of admin on the fly. Now, let's talk Cronulla Sharks. And we'll get back to all that other crazy stuff as well later on. What'd you make of the game? What'd you make of the performance? I think we are probably being a little bit too critical on a side that is missing their million dollar halfback and their captain best player dummy half.

[00:06:15] At the time, like that first half was kind of like pulling teeth. And it was just a very dour sort of experience. And we were losing at halftime, right, if I'm correct? 12-6, I think, yeah. Yeah. So again, that was a little bit flat, but the way they came out in the second half, I thought was really good to see. And I loved some of the support play, especially for the try for Kennedy. Billy Burns turned that on out of absolutely nothing. Like, I've watched the replay three or four times, and I just can't believe how easily he just made that break.

[00:06:45] And to have Puru and Kennedy supporting him was great. And some of the tries that we scored in the second half, it was very demoralizing for the Dragons. And you kind of wonder where do they go from here? Because some of their attempts in defense, like I saw a thing from Andrew Johnson. He was saying that Moses Sully should go in the middle of the field and have to make 20 tackles in a row because his effort on Iro was so poor that he had to show something to his teammates. So I agree. It's weird to see the state that they're in.

[00:07:10] I couldn't believe the way Iro did that because as I noted, he was pretty much on one leg and he was very good in that one leg. But to see him, because I could see what they were doing from where we were sitting at that aerial shot. We were like, okay, they're going to get left here. And it's the, I mean, it's a very NRL move, but it's a very shark move to sort of like get on the outside, go ahead, then pass. We see Katoa do it quite a lot as well. But to pull that off and then Stone Street obviously had the speed as well. So congrats to him. Yeah, the Dragons.

[00:07:39] I mean, at halftime, I wasn't overly concerned because our handling was at 60%. I thought, well, if we increase that to about 80, which we did, it'll all be okay. There was no respect for the ball. And they had all the ball and they were doing nothing with it. They scored a couple of tries. They were not really cracking our whole defensive line. It was more one-on-ones and that kind of thing. And I really wasn't overly concerned. I obviously wanted to be the next to score in the second half and we did.

[00:08:06] But the Dragons, like for all the kind of first half social media and commentary about how great they were. I mean, they were playing to their strengths. You know, I wouldn't say they were reinventing rugby league. And there's nothing wrong with that. Like they were tough and they played to their strengths. They completed their sets, but they had nothing in attack. And I wasn't therefore too concerned that our first half performance was going to affect the second half as long as they could flick the switch. And they did, which was awesome.

[00:08:34] The only thing that was a little bit concerning to me was the fact, again, we got caned with penalties. I think the penalty count was 4-1 overall. And it's getting to the point where it's so hard to watch because it just seems so lopsided. And I can't wrap my head around why we are such a perceived ill-disciplined side when you look at last year and where we sat on that penalty ranking sort of system that they have. So, yeah, it's an area of concern for me, the fact that we keep getting caned with penalties.

[00:09:04] Because if you do that against a good side, it's going to come back to bite you. And, you know, the Dragons, they didn't offer a lot in attack. It's got to be said. Yeah, I thought at times it was a really hard watch as a spectator and as a fan. Just the officiating and just the way the game went. Maybe it wasn't all about the official, but just the way the two teams played, especially that first half was pretty dour. And the second half was a lot more exciting, obviously for us, because we held the ball and we scored some good tries, had a lot of possession.

[00:09:32] Who was your breakout player of the game if you had one? Honestly, I thought it was Will Kennedy again, celebrating a new contract and that swan dive that he did for the try. I thought Kennedy was kind of one of the standard players for us. But it has to also be said, Billy Burns, when he came off the bench, I thought was absolutely incredible. And that try that he set up for Kennedy, I thought was unbelievable. And Britt, he had a really strong performance himself as well.

[00:09:59] So there was a few sort of weird things that were going on in that game. The fact that Fennell Blake played the whole first, what, 50 minutes and then came on for the last eight minutes. There was just, it was a weird sort of, a weird sort of game. I find it hard to put my finger on it because they scored 34 points, was it in the end? But it didn't feel like a game where they put on 34 points. Like it was, the Bermuda Triangle effect I think was real. Yeah, that was in effect. I thought Will Kennedy was really great.

[00:10:28] There was some, you know, some hiccups here or there, but you're probably going to get that with Will. I thought there were probably more hiccups than usual yesterday, to be fair. But he was still electric and still, I thought, game changing. And I mean, I talk about it quite a lot, but some of the stuff I see online about him, particularly in game, like you go back and look at stuff in game and people are just tearing players apart and him in particular. And it's like, okay, I get it. He's spilled a ball or he's dropped a bomb or I get all that.

[00:10:56] But the way they tear this bloke apart, then they don't have the guts afterwards to go, oh, he's sick enough, was great. And he did this, he did that. It's just like such a ball of negativity, which is not what we're here for. We're here to talk a win, a great win in the end. Britton Nicker was awesome. He did what we want him to do, like run direct, run straight, make some meters and be involved. And we've spoken about how he's off the ball involved, but that's not as exciting as when he's got the ball on and involved.

[00:11:24] So I thought him and Jesse Colquhoun and Will Kennedy were exceptional. And they were all pretty good in the second half, but I thought those were exceptional. When the two fellas with mullets, Colquhoun and Burns came on together at the same time, you noticed a bit of a change in the style the Sharks were playing. And we looked a little bit faster, which was conducive to what we were trying to do. So that was very positive, I thought. But to see Britt running like that, I was a little bit nervous.

[00:11:53] I was going to take that try off him just because there was the two Sharks players standing in the line. He's going to be scattered like naughty school children. But he got his state of origin spot now, right? So he's going to be starting in game two for the Queensland team. And I think that experience is going to be great for him. It's going to be super interesting to see what happens with Fanua Blake when they name the teams later this afternoon or tonight. But no Britt this week. It's such a privilege to have Burns to be able to come and play that role going into this Warriors game.

[00:12:22] Because if Fanua Blake doesn't play, we're not too bad off. But the fact that we're already going to be missing Braley and probably we're going to be missing Nico Hines for this game as well. To have a guy like Burns coming off the bench and replacing the Cora, it's great. If we could get those two guys firing at the same time, as well as Teague, I think we could really change the fortunes of our season. Yeah, so we do have a tough game coming up. We will be missing...

[00:12:48] The way that the coach was talking, he didn't sound confident about Hines. And my mail is it's not strong odds that he'll play. Jesse Ramien I thought was closer, but the coach in the press was really umming over it. So I don't know how confident he is with Jesse Ramien. Yeah. And also too, we saw Haradi out in the centers and we didn't see Sifatalkai at all in that game, which I thought was so surprising. So he addressed that, you haven't seen the press, he addressed that.

[00:13:18] And he said that he was giving Sifat the week off because he had some bumps and bruises and needed a bit of a rest, right? Like from a medical point of view. So he gave him the week off. But then when I think Ramien went down, he said to Sifat, we're going to need you on the six man bench, but we probably won't use you, but we need you there as cover. And Sifat's like, yeah, whatever. That's all good. But the actual plan was to not name him at all. I don't know how much I buy that.

[00:13:46] I don't think he'd go to that length of lie, to be honest. Well, look, I'm not calling Fitzy a fibber. There's plenty of people I have called fibbers in recent times and Fitzy is on top of that list. Yeah. So it just feels a little bit weird for me because even when you were talking before the game with me and we were talking about who was going to miss out on that bench. In my world, if Sifat Alakai puts on a Sharks jersey and puts his shorts on, you're playing him in that team.

[00:14:15] He's in our best 17 players. So I get the fact that somebody had to miss out and you can't have Colquhoun miss out. You can't have Burns miss out. You needed to have another hooker on the bench because of the situation with Blake. And then it was coming down to Tom or Sifat. Yeah. And Oregon was there as well, to be fair. But from all reports is that Sifat wasn't in the plan. I think they just named him, yeah, as I said, for that extra, extra coverage, which you don't really need a sixth person on the bench to play.

[00:14:45] Like things have to get pretty bad for the all six to play. So it sounds like he was kind of close, but they wanted to give him that week off, get the body ready. I know for a fact, as much as they've been focusing on the Dragons game, and they really did. I know the Warriors game has been on the calendar because of the situation with origin first up. And then since then all the injuries mounting up.

[00:15:10] So the Warriors game with a shorter turnaround, given today's recovery day and it's Monday, we're playing on Saturday in different country. Like it's a weird week. So there could be something in that where Sifat might play extra minutes this week. Well, I can't remember if it was Sifat's last game that he played, but was that the game where he only played like eight to 12 minutes or something like that? I believe so. So yeah, the more we're talking about it, the more it's kind of making sense that he could be a little bit banged up.

[00:15:37] And the fact that if you look at Horodi was in the centers because we had an injury with Rami not being there. Iro's basically playing on one leg. Michael Gabriel is injured in New South Wales Cup. I don't think he's back at the moment either. So in terms of if there was to be an injury in the back line somewhere, I get the view of, well, we need to have Sifat on the bench because there's no one really else we could have put on there besides maybe a Riley Jones or someone like that to play that sort of role.

[00:16:04] So yeah, look, hopefully Sifat's fine and can get back on the field. It's going to be very, very interesting to see what 17 that we put out on the field next week against the Warriors because it's a really big game and it could mean a lot to our season. If you look at where we are at the ladder, we would go to eight and five versus say seven and six. And we need to start making that jump because teams like the Cowboys have not had a bye yet and we've had two byes. So the ladder is very skewed at the moment.

[00:16:34] I'm getting a bit of a feeling that the importance of this match is not going to be met with the team they are able to put out there. In other words, I think we will be a bit banged up. We know that we'll be under strength. We'll be missing at least half our spine, I would think. Not more than half our spine. We'll be missing half our spine. So, you know, I am going there to win. I have whatever expectation to win. There's ways to win against this team who probably will be missing a few guys themselves.

[00:17:03] But I do think that we're already up against it with the injury slash rep toll. If you just even from a dollar's percentage wise, like Nico and Blake Braley would represent a huge percentage of our salary cap and what our spend is. Top two? Top three? Top three maybe? Well, that would be two of our top three. I would, Furnow or Blake would be up there as well. But if you were to say, like, who else is in that top echelon of players that we're paying that money?

[00:17:32] Apparently, Trindle has a big jump in his contract for next year. So he'll be in that realm next year. But in terms of this year, like those are the main sort of guys that would be showing up a lot of salary cap. But it's a tremendous opportunity for the two Puru brothers that they probably wouldn't have got. And the fact that it's at the same time where they can play together, it's huge. And they're brothers. They've been playing together for years. They played in the penalty system together. So having a nine and a seven that have that connection is wonderful for us to have. Yeah.

[00:18:01] And it just put more emphasis on Tricky and making sure that he can provide what he did. And to be fair, in the second half, I thought Tricky really stood up and put a stamp on the game. I thought the first half was pretty flat. Some of those kicks were just not in. Mm-hmm. The second half, I thought he had a much improved performance. Yeah. And he had to. And we talked about that in the grandstand, like he had to. And he did, to be fair. Let's talk about the Puru's. I think Nephi is really just playing a really smart game. He's not overplaying, which I absolutely respect the hell out of him for.

[00:18:30] Because it'd be so, I think for want of a better word, easy or kind of, you might just forget the moment and you'd sort of do what you might do at park footy and chip and chase or whatever. He's really playing a solid brand of football. He's not putting any feet wrong. And just really reliable player is backing up for that try. He's kicking more yesterday. It wasn't the best kicking performance I've ever seen, but it was certainly competent. Like, there was nothing wrong with it.

[00:19:01] And defensively, still going pretty good for a guy whose strength is not tackling. So I'm really happy with him and for him. Now, at some point, we probably need a bit more because otherwise it is all on Trindle. And I don't think that's unfair for Trindle. Like, he's the star on the big money and more experienced. Like, I'm not saying that's unfair, but everyone needs a bit of a hand. So I think at some point, Nephi might need to step out of the shell a little bit. But that's certainly not a criticism. Like, I think he's going really good.

[00:19:31] And I thought that his brother, Hojepa, yesterday was a lot more of a solid, not as remarkable performance like the Bulldogs game, but certainly just a really strong, decent effort. And then when Beryl came on, he kind of stole the show because he was running a lot more direct. To be fair, he's actually employed as a hooker, whereas the LFL is a middle forward.

[00:19:57] But the combination actually worked really well for all three of those guys. Yeah, it actually felt like they were more experienced than what their games had shown. Yes, absolutely. Because it's the benefit of having these players that have been playing in reserve grade for a really long time. And some of these guys have been playing together in reserve grade for a couple of years now as well. So it's kind of like a Newtown Jets kind of spine that we've kept together for a few years now.

[00:20:24] So I think that's the real benefit because I think the Puru brothers are both around 23. Are they twins, right? Yeah. I believe they're triplets. Are they? I think there's a third one. I read that just yesterday or something. These guys give us a level of stability that we don't get from having to throw in, say, a Riley Pollard, for example. Right. And there is a lot of people out there that are huge Riley Pollard fans. And, you know, I am too. And I hope he goes on and has a great, successful career. Me too, yeah.

[00:20:53] But to have a 23-year-old who's probably got 50 plus reserve grade games under his belt and the same with Beryl, who's got over 100 reserve grade games at this point in Queensland Cup, it just allows us to not experience the ups and the downs. I think we can keep that level of consistency going because we're bringing in experienced and mature players into these roles. Yeah, for sure. Very well said. We play the Warriors on Saturday. It's a tough run for us.

[00:21:20] And we're sort of, everyone's looking ahead the next, well, at least the next sort of two games. Warriors on Saturday away. And then the Sunday week late game is the Roosters with all the Origin players back in theory. Then we got the bye. So I don't want to go too much past that because after that it gets even hairier. But if we can jag one of the next two, I'm not saying we can't get both. I want to get both. I'm aiming for both. I'm kind of expecting both.

[00:21:48] But if we can't get both, say we get one of the next two and then the bye, we're still sitting in a pretty good spot given the circumstances of where we are. Yes, we dropped some games we should have won. But if we lose, for example, to either the Warriors or the Roosters and they get smashed by them, it's not unreasonable, right? They're two both really good teams. They're two top four teams in this season. They're two teams that people are expecting to be at the pointy end of September.

[00:22:18] And I would feel much more confident if we had Braley and Nico out there in these games. Absolutely. The fact that we don't really does concern me as we're going up against some of the strongest sides in the competition. But I look at it and I look at the Puru guys and I say, well, these are two guys that are 23 years old that have been in reserve grade for a really long time that have reached very high levels in reserve grade that have been crying out for a chance and an opportunity. And sometimes it's that unpredictability that unknown players can bring to this.

[00:22:48] As long as if the Roosters and Warriors aren't studying tape of all these guys, they've got the film of them. They know about these players. They've probably even had them in recruitment and retention discussions in their own ways over the years, right? These guys have been on the NRL radar for almost 10 years when you go back to like SG ball and all that type of stuff, Harold Matt. So clubs are aware of what these guys can do, but it gives us a bit of unpredictability that we can hopefully capitalize on.

[00:23:12] And if we can get Billy firing, if we can get Britt back for the Roosters game, if we can get Fanua Blake out there, it will give us a punch's chance against these teams. Now, I'm not willing to declare the season's over if we go 0-2 in the next two weeks, but I need us to get to the bye as relatively fit as possible so we can start to integrate Ramien back in, Nico back in, Braley back in. Because we saw that when Ronnie came back, what a difference it made to the team.

[00:23:40] And there are reports that Katoa is very close to coming back as well, too. So it's going to be interesting to see what they do with Stone Street there as well. But let's wait and see, because there's a lot of experience that's about to come back. And when we look like our proper team, and I think sometimes this year we've taken that for granted because it might just be one guy missing here or there.

[00:23:59] But when you've not made roster changes, that little change in not having that person there that you've banked on and you spent all last three years, four years, whatever it is at this point, on getting to, it just becomes very difficult. So I think we, for me, win both games, ideally. One of two I can live with. Zero and two not happy with. But as long as we get to the bye without any more longer-term injuries, I'll be happy.

[00:24:26] Now, our regular listener viewer, Jay, who's all over the stats, he said that except for one year, I'm guessing it might have been 22, every other year at this time of the year, Craig Fitzgibbon is 7 and 5. So going into whatever round we're going to, 15, Craig Fitzgibbon is 7 and 5. So in, what is it, four of the five years. So we've gone on to be in prelims, et cetera. So it's certainly not a bad place to be, as I will double down on.

[00:24:55] We did lose some games we shouldn't have. But what I like hearing is the fact we've had some tough games against Manly. We had a relatively tough game yesterday for, you know, 50 minutes or whatever. We're not in these blowout games where it's just all one-sided. And so there's a bit of... Well, we are still stacking up the points. No, we are. But my point is yesterday was a wrestle. It was a grind. And I thought that the Manly game was a grind.

[00:25:20] And so the fact that we sort of were able to come from behind, they weren't, you know, 50-point blowouts. I think we're going to need that for Roosters and Warriors. Like, I think our defense is going to have to win us the games. Yeah. And I was just looking at my phone just now while you were talking because yesterday you brought up the fact that we don't play a lot at Shark Park in the next period of games. And our next home game at Shark Park is until July 17th.

[00:25:48] And then after that, we don't play again until the 2nd of August against South at Shark Park. So between now and effectively August, well, there's only one month the end in between, we're on the road and we're against quality opposition. So they need to get their systems right. They need to get the players back. Why can we need to start building? Because it's not like last year where last year we had a tremendous run home where I don't think we went further than, say, the Central Coast or Newcastle, Canberra, whatever the case was, for like 12 weeks.

[00:26:17] Whereas this one, it's a bit of travel. I think there's back-to-back trips to Brisbane. There's games in New Zealand. So, like, you've got to make the games count. You've got to bank the points now while they're available because you don't want to be chasing. There is a real logjam around the top eight and we just can't find ourselves in that mix. That's why yesterday was so important, you know, because it's a winnable game. Go win the game. Like, whatever you've got to do, I know you're down 12-6. Everyone's against you. Just go win. And they won comfortably, which was awesome.

[00:26:47] And, man, Will Kennedy, we did talk about him. So we won't labor too much because this is a bit of an abbreviated episode. But you happy with the one-year deal? You cool with that? Well, it puts him and Isen in competition for another 12 months. And we've kicked that can down the road. And maybe there was people at the club that might have thought that Isen would have taken this role, maybe Dykes a few years ago or whatever the case was. But there's nobody out there in the market that I think you can go and buy that will give you what Will gives us.

[00:27:17] And if Isen is good enough, and I saw his stats from last week in reserve grade, they were unbelievable stats. They were like 200-plus running metres. Finding his feet. Yeah. So that's perfect. And that's what we want. And we need him doing that for a while so that if the opportunity comes up, like we've seen with the Puru brothers, that he can then grab it with both hands. And in my perfect world, there is a part of the year next year or maybe even this year where Isen gets his hands on that jersey

[00:27:45] and he kicks on and becomes a player that a lot of people think that he can be. So the fact that we still have the insurance and backup policy of Will for another 12 months, the money that we're paying for Will for another 12 months, the combination that he's got and how much he means to that playing roster, I cannot see a world where people can complain about that signing. Although I find the complaints. Now, here's where I get confused though, right? People keep talking about the word competition. So A, I'm an Isen guy like I am. And I think that long term, he can be our guy.

[00:28:14] I don't get the need for Will to have competition and hear me out because I get that they all should have competition. I understand that notion. But if you and I think that Will is top three, top five every week for the past three years barring some games, why does someone like that need someone on his heels? You know what I mean? Like, yes, you want the insurance. I like the insurance. I don't get the – because I'm hearing that last 24 hours. Oh, there's someone to compete with Will. Why does Will need someone to compete with?

[00:28:44] He's our guy. It just comes back to the fact that we're not going to be able to move on Blake Braley and we don't want to. We're not going to be able to move on – No, no, no. I guess what I'm saying is – I guess what I'm saying is – no, no. What I'm saying is I think we're all kind of acknowledging that Will's getting older. He signed a one-year deal. P&G are coming in. Perth are probably looking for a new guy by then already. He will probably move on at some point. I admit that as a Will Kennedy fan.

[00:29:11] But if we got him until the end of next year, wouldn't it be best for the Sharks if Will Kennedy was like an 8 out of 10 this year and next year until we get to the premiership next year and win it two years in a row or whatever? Absolutely. And I think when it comes to Will – and we're seeing this with Jesse Ramian and Michael Gabriel. The club has made a decision there to not offer Jesse the money that he wanted and the same with Katoa and Stone Street.

[00:29:39] The fact that we have given Will the offer and to be fair, if Will is playing how he is playing right now, he's in the team every single week until the end of next season. It would take something colossal from Ison to unseat him. But with everything and the way that Fitzgibbon coaches, he's not going to drop Will Kennedy.

[00:29:58] The only opportunity I see for Ison is an injury or it would take an insane run of bad form where I'm talking poor carriage in the 1998 finals against the Bulldogs. It would take something like that a couple of weeks in a row to get Will dropped because – I know we've gotten a few hours Canterbury Power, but that's the third time in 72 hours poor carriage has come up. It's been my world and I love it. I'm here for it.

[00:30:24] Well, I would like to know the other two, but I'm also distracted by it looks like you've got a ghost in the blinds behind you. So I don't know if that window's open, but I just saw the blinds move and I got a little bit scared. The ghost of Paul carriage. There you go. The ghost of Paul – what do you reckon Paul carriage is doing right now? He's doing stuff. He pops on the King's birthday. He's not watching those things. Right now. He's not watching Fox coming up because they might show it. Chael and I will show it. I think for our younger viewers, you need to go look at that. There's a 90-second clip. I know this clip.

[00:30:54] I watched it on Friday night at work. It's a 90-second clip of Paul carriage and it's – look, it's fun. We can laugh about it now, but it's the worst rugby league you'll ever see on a field and might leave it at that. How did we get to Paul carriage? Yeah, so Will Kennedy's not Paul carriage. Hey, we had a bit of a disturbance during the week and you found yourself in a bit of a brouhaha. I love the fact that you take me in it because then I was in it. Ouss, ouss, ouss. I couldn't get out of it.

[00:31:21] So someone went on to a podcast and lied through their teeth about the sharks. We know that whole story. It's been covered from pillar to post. You got anything else you want to say about it? I'm surprised it caught as many people as it did and I am surprised – I'm getting messages from people like you and other people listening to the show who have politicians now in parliament talking about it.

[00:31:46] Yeah, and it was such a felonious statement that I had to jump in there and call it out as an absolute just dribble because there is no way the NRL is investing in the hotel that they've done to then have that ground essentially rendered useless. Now, Peter Volandis has been such a staunch supporter of suburban grounds.

[00:32:13] If this was past NRL administration, I could see them trying to put pressure on us to actually do these things and get out of Shark Park. Volandis has let us play home finals there and now they're saying this year, okay, you can't do it, whatever. We've had a good run with the home finals. No, no, they haven't officially said it. They haven't officially said it. They probably will. But it's going to depend on the opponent, dude. If it's the Cowboys again, we're playing down there. Yeah, exactly. And that's the point that I'm trying to get to, right?

[00:32:40] So the idea that we would all of a sudden pick up our bags and leave Shark Park without a fight, without any sort of information getting out there to people like yourself versus coming from a Dragons fan, like it was just the most insane thing that I saw. And the amount of people that just get caught by these things and just believe it, it was unbelievable.

[00:33:06] And I love that Ronnie today jumped in there and he tagged the fanatics and the thing and he basically said, up, up, this is our home and we love it. And Craig Fitzgibbon said some great stuff too around suburban football grounds and we love our home and we love it here. So the Sharks aren't going anywhere. It's actually probably going to help us try and get some more attention and funding for this sort of situation. You know what? I can't believe it. I can't believe it, dude.

[00:33:32] But I think the tide briefly, it may not stay that way, has turned with fan responses. And even on that podcast you spoke about, the main journalist on the reply episode, he actually went to bat for us. Despite the clip that they clipped up, you pointed out to me that he actually went to bat for us. Now I'm noticing on a lot of social media, like of course you're going to have the dingbats who say, kick him to Perth.

[00:34:01] You're going to have all those angry people just waiting for that moment. But I have noticed a bit of a sway in that, no, no, it's their ground. Let them do what they want. Yes, they need to fix it up. We all concede that. Everyone concedes that. But I think this is a bit of more love coming our way than what I thought it would be. Like it's kind of flipped, to be honest. It's an absolute badge of honour for the club. And I think it's something that a lot of us take for granted.

[00:34:28] We've put that money and that effort into maintaining and building that stadium ourselves. Every other club is getting government money to do such a thing. This club gives so much to the local Sutherland Shire area. It has produced so many stellar athletes, not only for the Sharks, but for other clubs. And the Sutherland Shire is so underrepresented with facilities. And the fact that we are a very affluent area, it doesn't make sense to me.

[00:34:57] Our population is tremendous in terms of sporting participation, male and female as well. David Riccio hit the nail on the head a few years ago talking to you on this podcast. And he's sort of saying we've got to get together as the Sutherland Shire wider community and push for this as a community. Because if they build us a new stadium out at Loftus or Sutherland or wherever it might be because they need the space, I think that's a win.

[00:35:23] And I can't see a Sharks fan being upset saying that they've got to travel to Sutherland or wherever the place may be. The ideal world is we get something like that. How realistic is it? I'm not sure. But then that would allow us to actually sell the ground and then get some more money as well. But that's not happening anytime soon because we've just spent all this money on a lease club. And when they're trying to say, oh, it's a $20 million loan that the Sharks have got for this lease club. Well, that's how money works. It's a $50 million bill. That means we've got $30 million of equity. That's a very strong position.

[00:35:53] The banks will go up to 90%. And also, too, you don't want to be paying cash for things. You want to be using things like loans and tax structures, but don't get me started on the government and all the other stuff. But old mate went pretty hard and it failed. And he probably got out of it what he wanted, all the clicks, and he probably got some more sponsorship and that kind of stuff. So you do your pod, A1, do your pod. But he looked like a fool. He sounded like a fool.

[00:36:21] Dino and the club, there was some criticism about them not jumping on the front foot straight away. But from their point of view, they didn't want to give some really insignificant person in the game any more hot air. They were just like, no, I don't think so. And, you know, I pointed out to a few people that, look, there's a lot of fans hot under the collar. And they were like, we respect that. We're going to make our statement in time.

[00:36:46] We're not going to reply to this and give the guy more credit than any credit that's needed. So I kind of don't mind that fact. And then there's other ways to get out the word, like through our shows and other shows, people saying, hey, it's baloney. Don't worry about it. And, you know, I pretty much spent 48 hours in line just answering things and recording things. And I'm happy to do it because it's a passionate thing for me. But, yeah, it really annoyed the heck out of me, that guy.

[00:37:12] And the fact that he was tagging us in things and I couldn't get out of it. And then, you know what's smart about him and the way that he's done it is every time I click on the tag, his bloody video plays. So he's getting more clicks and more clicks. And it's just like this is not even remotely cool, bro. And we don't know if it was the guy replying. We should point out it could have been the admin kid. It could have been anyone, to be fair, to be fair. But it's under the guy's brand. Just really immature stuff.

[00:37:40] I didn't really care for the way he was referring to you and I about stuff. And then his one thing in his back pocket was the Sharks had met with New South Wales venues. And he thought that I and us didn't know. And we did know. And I will repeat, it's not the Sharks' business to tell everyone about every meeting they have. They had a business meeting. And it wasn't about what he thought it was. That's the reason he went off. Aside from being a dragon, man, that's the reason he went off.

[00:38:09] Like, give me a break. And I just want to say just quickly, we have taken games to Port Macquarie for the last couple of years. We have now taken games to Perth. That is now off the table with the Perth Bears. We will move a home game to somewhere to get the cash. So we might take one to the Central Coast. Or I live in Sydney. If we take a game to Allianz, I'm actually not upset about that if it's one game. Because I can attend that game.

[00:38:37] I can't go to Perth and watch the Sharks play or go to Port Macquarie, right? So it's an opportunity for us to have a quick hit from cash. I would love all the games to be at Shark Park. Don't get me wrong. But if we do move one game, moving the game 20 kilometers to the city, Nicogra, I would prefer to do without. But let's say we take the game against the Perth Bears to the SFS next year instead of to Perth. That's not the end of the world to me. And it's money in the club's pocket.

[00:39:03] And with the TV rights, everything like that that's going on right now, they don't need the money to do it. But it's just that overhead that they remove from their balance sheet. Because when we have games at Shark Park, we're paying for catering, security, lighting. That's coming out of our pockets. Whereas we would get a cash incentive to go and do this versus going to do it in Perth or wherever this situation would be. I genuinely don't know who David Gallop from Venues New South Wales had meetings with other than the Sharks.

[00:39:32] But I can tell you he had meetings with other clubs. But it's interesting that the other podcast didn't mention that. And that tells you agenda, agenda, agenda. Let's move on. We're going to get out of here. Kieran, Warriors this week, it's going to be a tough one. It's certainly not unwinnable. We've gone over there in the past and won grinding, rainy, cloudy, muddy games. So I don't know what the weather's like in New Zealand this week. But it's usually a little bit... It's always terrible. And that might help us.

[00:40:02] That might help us given that two of our best attacking players are out this week at least in Hines and Blake Bradley. We'll see what the team's like on Tuesday afternoon. But Craig Fitzgibbon, I don't think he was mucking around when he said at the press conference, so I'm not sure what the team we'll be able to name next week. But we'll go out there and give it a crack, you know? They're going to play to win. And sometimes that's not the worst thing, playing these big teams. Like sometimes you can go underdog and just wrestle it out.

[00:40:31] And you probably can't do it every week for seven weeks, to be fair. But you can definitely do it one or two games into a bye. I don't mind that. I'm glad the bye is coming up. Yeah. And if you look at one of the best wins that we've had in recent years, it was that round one game over in New Zealand when nobody was tipping the Sharks. Everybody was saying... It was 24, I believe. 24. Okay. I believe it was 24. Maybe even... No, it wasn't last year. We were in Vegas last year.

[00:40:57] But that was a great example of the Sharks going over there and doing a hit-and-run job. And we've seen it a couple of times when the backs have gone up against the wall. I go back to that miserable night in Wollongong where we had a couple of injuries and they pumped the Dragons in the wet. There's been a few times where the Sharks have been kind of written off and people sort of said, oh, they're not going to be any chance here. But the Warriors are a great team. They've got a few injuries themselves. It's going to be interesting to see what they put out there on the field. Has Metcalf played? Has he not? Yeah, he might.

[00:41:26] Because Metcalf came back during that game against us earlier this season, right? I think so, yeah. He was underdone. And then he was underdone, a lot of other stuff. So there's going to be a bit of feeling there between that and all the players that have kind of came and gone since then. So I'm really looking forward to it. Yeah, me too. And the one thing that I'll say about our subs and our backup guys is that they have game faces. Like they're not guys I don't trust. Like I wouldn't necessarily pick some of these guys over the starting players. And that's an obvious statement, sure.

[00:41:56] But Hohe Papuru, like I said it when I interviewed him during the week, like I probably haven't met a more impressive footballer to speak to in 12 years of doing this. He'd be in my top five, maybe top 10 out of the 400 interviews I've done. Like he was unbelievable from a football point of view. You've seen the way he plays. You've seen the way his brother has stepped up when many, many people said, uh-uh, he's not the guy. Okay. He may not be the guy, but he's so far so good. Beryl is a very serious dude. He's not young.

[00:42:26] He's a mature guy. He knows that every chance could be his last. He knows that he's playing for contracts. And I just, I like that. It gives me, and I've said this before and I apologize, it gives me 2016 vibes as far as the guys that come in. Because sometimes we've got guys coming in and it ain't that good. And that's just how footy is. It's how sport is. But when you can get that recruitment right, you can't have it every year just because of the way it all works. But in 2016, we had it almost near perfect. I don't think this is near perfect, but it's pretty impressive.

[00:42:55] The only thing I would like to see from us is another outside back. I just feel like we're one outside back short. If something happens to Haradi, then we start to have to dabble in this if it goes back to centers. And I don't really like that. Given Gabriele, he's also injured as well. There is Riley Jones who you have in the wings. But is that his best position? Gabriele did play on the weekend. He's back. That's great. That's great news. But again, he's had some time out and things like that.

[00:43:22] So I would love us to get a really sort of athletic winger, fullback, center type player. There's this really good player that I've heard of called Joey Manu. So I'm looking forward to the club signing him and getting him across the line. We've got 22 days to get it done. So don't let me down, Cronulla. A little birdie yesterday with the initials. KF told me he wanted to be the one to present him with the jersey when he arrives. I've called it. And because it came out on his SCN show where he said he's heard the sharks have signed and outside back.

[00:43:52] Well, you know SCN have ties with shark cars, right? There you go. So maybe we should hit up your friend Brooksy to get us some information around what's going on here. I think he might be getting the information from us, but we'll just wait and see. I'm causing chaos. Let's go. That's what you do. It was a fun day yesterday, man. We went down to the hairy man and we had some drinks and some food with some lovely people. And we encourage everyone to do that next time we have a gathering somewhere. Everyone's welcome. Just talk footy.

[00:44:21] Pretty much nothing else. Just footy. Occasionally, you'll try and bring in like a UFO thing and I'll be like, no, no, wrong time, wrong place, buddy. No UFO stuff here. We don't have time for any of that right now either, Cron. What's coming? It's coming. Disclosure Day. Oh, the movie. We don't have time for it. No, it's very weird that they've got a movie called Disclosure Day when there's also all this other stuff going on. We've got Reptilians. We've got Portals. I know I sent you a video about that. There's Ross Coulthard.

[00:44:48] Go look him up, the former 60 Minutes guy from New Zealand who lived in Australia. Very posh guy. He's got some incredible stuff on YouTube. After you like and subscribe, Shark Cast on YouTube. Yeah, I hear that you need to like and subscribe. Just subscribe, I think, on the YouTube. So we are doing a bit of a reach out to everyone. So if you're not following us on the YouTube, it's one of many platforms we're on. We should point out we're on a lot of platforms. That's one of them. And if you give us a subscribe there, it's free.

[00:45:16] Just hit the button and you're done. And that will help us out apparently. Go get out of here, my friend. Thanks for your time. Safe travels. And we will talk to you very soon, I am sure. Let's go out with a bit of a song. Up Up Cronulla. We rule the world. We certainly rule the South. Shark Cast is supported by the best and most honest real estate agent in the Sutherland Shire, Jason Hawes from Crips and Crips Real Estate.

[00:45:45] He's an expert in the Karimba region and has his eye all across the shire. Lifelong Sharks fan and supporter of this podcast. If you're looking to buy or sell in the region, the person you need to be talking to is Jason Hawes from Crips and Crips Real Estate. Call him on 0410 417 450. That's 0410 417 450. Jason Hawes, Crips and Crips Real Estate. Shut up, man!

[00:46:29] Turn your porch lights off. Put their cupboard over.