Wests Tigers coach Benji Marshall has slammed his side following their hapless 56-14 loss to the Dragons — which has extended their losing streak to nine straight games.
Entering halftime leading 14-12, the Tigers conceded 44 second-half points in a sensational collapse that saw them complete just four of 11 sets and run for 222 metres.
Marshall didn’t mince his words in his press conference, stating: “If the actions don’t change, then the players will change.”
Much of the coach’s frustrations come from his side’s ability to consistently shoot themselves in the foot.
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“Yeah, very disappointing. We seem to say the same thing every week, which is unfortunate,” he said.
“At the same time, we give ourselves every opportunity. We start with a lot energy, (14-12 at half time). To have 20 per cent of the ball and have as many errors as we did, schoolboy errors to be honest, (it’s) unacceptable.”
Seven of the Tigers’ 11 errors came in the second forty, while ill-discipline plagued them, as has been the case this whole season.
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Halfback Jayden Sullivan was sent to the sin bin for a professional foul on Luciano Leilua in the 49th minutes. He was the Tigers’ ninth sin bin of the season, the most of any NRL club.
Marshall admitted the club’s discipline is “hurting us.”
“We find someone to get sin-binned every week. (To) give away silly penalties. We lost our head (and) unfortunately we’re in a position where we can’t do it to ourselves and we do,” he said.
“I cannot talk about discipline enough. The whole week we’ve talked about discipline and it’s unacceptable. There’s no excuses.”
The Wests Tigers coach was, however, adamant his side is on the right path.
“Although tonight was terrible, there’s definitely been improvements and we’re on a path to building for our future, especially with our local juniors,” Marshall said.
“I thought tonight we showed glimpses at the start of the team we want to be, particularly (in) the first half.
“The confidence diminishes when you do silly things. At 10-nil up the confidence was high, the energy was high. You could feel it amongst the team.
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However, he reiterated that his side were their own worst enemy on multiple occasions in their loss to the Dragons, particularly during the second half.
“And then three silly errors into a yardage penalty and they’re 12-10 back up. We let them back into the game. As much as they had a good second half, we did it to ourselves.
The Tigers also came under fire from their head coach for being a “professional team that can play for 20 minutes at a time (but) we can’t play for 40. We can’t just put together 80 minutes at the moment.”
Marshall would later insist the club’s back-to-back wins against the Cronulla Sharks in Round 2 and the Parramatta Eels in Round 3 “gave expectations that weren’t real and a bit of hype that we were probably better than what we were.”
“There’s still actions that we’re doing that we’ve been doing for the last nine weeks.”