NRL 2021: Dragons Covid breach leaves coach Anthony Griffin scrambling to pick a side
Dragons coach Anthony Griffin says he has been ‘gutted’ by the club’s Covid breach, as he revealed who would likely come into the team to cover for his banned stars.
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St George Illawarra coach Anthony Griffin’s mission to save the Dragons’ season will start at what he predicts will be a “long meeting” on Wednesday when he works out exactly how to stagger the bans to his disgraced players across the club’s next four games.
Fresh from the axing of star prop Paul Vaughan, Griffin has 12 players facing one-match bans for biosecurity breaches that must be served over a minium of two rounds and a maximum of four.
A deflated Griffin confronted the media on Tuesday afternoon via Zoom, where the devastation was written all over his forlorn face.
“It’s been a disappointing few days,” he said.
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“As a member of the club, just gutted that we’re in this situation but we’ve dealt with it now.
“On behalf of the club, as the coach of the club, I apologise to our fans and our members and sponsors. But I think the club’s dealt with this really strongly today and fairly and we get a chance to move on now.”
The seventh-placed Dragons face Manly, Gold Coast, South Sydney and Canberra over the next month and Griffin said the club would not let the drama derail a possible finals berth.
“We’ll have another long meeting on that tomorrow (Wednesday) and work out how we space those suspensions out. But we have a plan we think is going to give us the best shot at winning games,” Griffin said.
“We’ve worked really hard under some trying circumstances this year to put ourselves in a really good position and we don’t intend to let that go easily.
“We’ll work with the NRL on the suspensions, we understand the suspensions and we accept that ruling.
“We’ll put our best team on the park every week possible over the next four weeks in an effort to win games and stay in finals contention.”
Griffin’s side lead a pack of seven teams chasing the final two spots in the top eight.
Given Gold Coast and Canberra are also in finals contention, those matches take on extra significance and Griffin will no doubt stack the side for those two games as best he can.
“We’ve got some really good people in our club and the people involved in this are good people that have made a terrible error of judgment in what they’ve done,” Griffin said.
“We’ll grow out of this and become stronger. We’re in a really good position as a club despite some of these things.
“We’ve had a really challenging year with suspension and injuries we’ve already come through and we’ve still got a shot at the back end of the year and we’ll be stronger for this as well.”
They club won’t quite have to hang a sign out the front of St George Leagues Club asking for interested footballers to apply within in order to field a side against the Sea Eagles and Rabbitohs, but they won’t be far off it.
Jack de Belin, Matt Dufty, Josh McGuire, Blake Lawrie, Zac Lomax, Corey Norman, Daniel Alvaro, Jack Bird, Josh Kerr, Kaide Ellis, Tyrell Fuimaono and Gerard Beale all facing a week out, Griffin will have to dig deep into his roster, particularly when it comes to forwards.
Jaiyden Hunt, a veteran of two NRL games, could be forced to start in the front row while Poasa Faamausili becomes one of the pack’s most experienced players with his 36 starts.
Mid-season recruit Billy Burns (20 NRL games) will become vital due to his ability to play both second row and centre and the club will have to rely on their Origin contingent of Tariq Sims, Ben Hunt and Andrew McCullough more than ever before.
Hunt and Sims have both been named to play in the final match of the series on Wednesday night.
Hayden Lomax, older brother of Zac, and Jackson Shereb, two young backrowers, will come into contention for their NRL debuts.
The backline and spine spots might be easier to fill with the Dragons boasting some fine young talent out wide who’s progression to first grade may now be accelerated.
Tyrell Sloan, who scored a try in his NRL debut against Canberra last month, should replace Dufty at fullback while the Feagai twins, Max (five games) and Mat (one game), can fill a hole in the outside backs.
Junior Amone (five games) can slot in at five-eighth, halfback or centre and shapes as a good option as a utility while the impressive Jayden Sullivan, a 19-year old halfback, could add to his single NRL appearance.
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Originally published as NRL 2021: Dragons Covid breach leaves coach Anthony Griffin scrambling to pick a side
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