2022 Shute Shield Season Review: Eastwood
Eastwood fell agonisingly short of a second straight Shute Shield grand final, losing to eventual premiers Sydney Uni in a thriller at Rat Park.
A number of players from Ben Batger’s side have been rewarded for their form with professional opportunities around the world, but the coach seems confident his side will be able to rebuild and compete for the premiership in 2023.
Overview with Ben Batger:
“You’d probably classify it as a good season, not a great season,” coach Ben Batger said.
“Obviously to get to one game short of the grand final is pleasing but we want to be playing in grand finals and pushing for premierships and we weren’t able to do that this year.
“We can’t put the preliminary final loss against Uni all on Tano (Tane Edmed). If you watched the Australia A game last week, he nailed a goal from the sideline to win the game against Japan, so he’s obviously learnt a lot from the experience.
“Tano is going to have a lot of good moments throughout his career and if you’re going to have lots of good moments, then the chances are you’re going to have a few bad ones as well.
“The loss wasn’t on him though, we had our chances to win that game and while it looked like it came down to a few kicks, really we should have taken our other opportunities.
“I thought we adjusted to the style of the competition well this year. We’re normally a ball in hand team but most of the other sides wanted to play a territory game. There was a lot of kicking and a lot of mauling. We lost a few games on the run and realised we were probably trying to hold the ball for too long and play too much rugby.
“But we adapted and came good at the right end of the season. We also had a lot of moving parts with different players coming in and out and I think we managed that quite well.
“In terms of things we could have done better, I should of got the memo that mauls were going to be the key to the 2023 Shute Shield competition. I missed that one and I think we spent about a third of the time Sydney Uni spent on their maul throughout the season.
“That’s on me, I should have been ahead of that trend.
“We were also too ill disciplined. We had 17 yellow cards in 20 matches, the most in the competition, so I think we need to work on that as well.
What needs to happen at the club between now and round one next year?
“Firstly, we’re going to have to bring some new players into the first grade squad. We’ve got a number of guys taking up different professional and semi-professional opportunities overseas.
“George Worth has gone back to the UK, Fabian Goodall is off to the MLR, Sam Delores is going to Italy, James Wayland is playing in the Championship, Lachie Shelley has signed with Leicester Tigers.
“We’re really proud as a club that we’ve helped those guys earn their opportunities and it’s also opened the door for other players to step up into our first grade squad.
“We had a really strong 1st colts side this year who finished just one game short of the grand final and we’ve got seven or eight of those who I think will be in and around our 1s and 2s squads.
“We’ll rebuild and then probably make a couple of little changes. We weren’t far off this year but we’ll certainly be putting a bit more emphasis into our maul, that’s a given. We’ll also be working on our kick strategy, that seems to be the way that the game is evolving.
“We worked a lot on our defence this year and it improved a hell of a lot and we’ll keep working on that because defence always wins championships.”
Which of your players do you expect to go on to bigger things from next season?
“The one guy that I think the Super Rugby coaches should be looking at is Ratu Tuisese. He finished second in the Catchpole (Medal) and was a clear standout for us.
“A lot of people don’t know that 2022 was only his third year playing in the forwards and only his fourth year of rugby so to be the second best player in the competition with limited rugby experience, it’s pretty impressive and he’s got a lot of upside.
“Zac Hickey is another player to watch. He played about 10 first grade games for us this year and is a big 6’3, 100 kilo outside back. He’s got a lot of potential and stamped himself in first grade this season.”
What can we expect in 2023 from your club and the competition?
“I hope we can expect the Woods to go one better and get into that grand final and hopefully win it in 2023. It was a really tough loss to take, that loss to Uni and the boys are highly motivated as a result of that.
“We’ll work hard over the offseason, set our expectations high and hopefully find a way to match them.
“For the competition, a lot of other coaches are predicting that it will keep getting closer and closer. I’m not 100% sure of that because I don’t think the models that some of the clubs are relying on are sustainable.
“I think it’ll be another ripping competition though and ever year it seems to get better and better. Whether it’s the closeness of results, the development of young players or the talent scattered throughout the competition, the Shute Shield just keeps going from strength to strength and it’s great to be a part of it.”