We’re now two weeks in to the 2023 Shute Shield season and a number of trends are starting to appear. 

While it’s still very early days and a number of sides are still finding their feet in another super tight competition, here are a few things we’ve noticed in the opening two rounds. 

New recruits making big difference

There is always a lot of movement and even more chatter about movement around the Shute Shield world over summer. But the quantity and quality of recruitment ahead of this season really stands out. 

Norths could have been heading into a rebuilding period, but recruits Jude Gibbs and Ratu Tagive have the Shoremen back to their best and at the top of the ladder. Lewis Ponini and Julien Heaven have made a massive difference to the Easts front row, as has Jack Hill in the backrow. 

Recruit Max Clementson and coach Cam Treloar seem to have got the best out of a number of West Harbour forwards who look big, mean and fit after two rounds. As has Cormac Daly and Steve Hoiles at Randwick. 

Lineout reigns supreme

More than half of the tries scored in the opening two rounds of the season have started from lineouts. While many of those have come from mauls, teams are also looking to launch from their lineout to attack in the midfield channel, and then out wide. 

While it’s fairly obvious that a strong lineout is going to give teams a big advantage, perhaps the bigger point to take from this is the importance of spoiling your opponent’s ball. 

Last year, the only time Sydney Uni really looked challenged through the regular season was when other side’s attacked their lineout hard. Not only does that reduce the risk of conceding points from a maul, but it also stops teams setting up their attack from the base of the lineout. 

There could be some big, ugly second rowers that have a big impact of this year’s competition. 

Big discrepancies in playing styles

It may be too early to call this after just two games each, but there are big discrepancies in the time some sides are playing with the ball in hand, compared to others. 

Easts, who under Simon Kneebone pride themselves on attacking from anywhere, have actually had the ball in hand and in play for close to five minutes less than Southern Districts. 

It’ll be interesting to watch this evolve throughout the season. Is quantity, or quality of ball in hand more important? 

Slow starts and poor finishes hurting teams

Slow starts have proved costly for several sides. Gordon have been poor in both first halves so far this year but managed to fight back in the second half against the Two Blues on the weekend. Manly and Sydney Uni were both out of the game by halftime in round one, as were Souths in round two. 

Eastwood have given up leads in their two losses, as have Warringah. 

On the other side of things, Hunter and Easts, two of the three undefeated sides left have both finished their two victories well and have the competition points on the board to prove it. 

It’s going to be bloody tight, again

Good luck trying to pick a top six to play finals. 

Norths have been the most impressive side of the opening fortnight, while Easts and Hunter have both found a way to grind out consecutive wins. 

Randwick, West Harbour and Souths all appear to be stronger than they were last year, while Eastwood and Warringah are winless but still extremely dangerous. 

In the middle of all of that, you have last year’s grand finalists in Sydney Uni and Gordon as well as Western Sydney and Manly outfits with some big names to return. 

How they all fit into a top six in time for finals footy in August is anyone’s guess at this stage.