Have you been able to catch your breath yet?
A dramatic Round 4 of the NRL gave us plenty to look back on in this week’s edition of 5 Lessons Learned.
Defence ruled the round with points at a premium and having a good kicker was never more important than it was here as kickers made all the difference for some teams.
1 – Dragons Drama
For the second week in a row, a Corey Norman field goal was the decisive point in a Dragons win.
Last week he nailed the kick as time expired to secure an upset win at Suncorp Stadium, while this week he waited until golden point to give the Dragons a second straight one point win as an underdog.
You could forgive a Dragons fan if their nerves are a bit shot this week after a couple of nail-biting finishes.
As they prepare to take on the Bulldogs this weekend, the Dragons will have to deal with favouritism for the first time all season.
2 – Tight Finishes all Around
The Dragons weren’t the only team to record a nail biting victory this weekend with three games decided by one point and a fourth by just two points.
Perhaps that should not have come as a surprise when looking at the lines to these games before Round 4 kicked off with all bar the Storm-Bulldogs game having a line of 4.5 or less.
Funnily enough though, the Storm were favoured by almost three tries for the biggest spread of the season to date and were nearly on the receiving end of the biggest upset of the season so far.
Having these small lines did lead to an interesting weekend for the favourites with a 5-3 record head to head and a 3-5 number against the spread.
The Tigers (+3.5) and Bulldogs (+16.5) went down on the scoreboard on the weekend but did manage to cover the spread in two of the games that had tense endings.
There’s another batch of tight lines already for this weekend with three games having the equal biggest spread of the round with 7.5 points.
3 – Underwhelming Scores
A week after teams lit up the scoreboard with a few high scoring games, points came at a premium in Round 4 of the NRL with defending taking centre stage.
All up seven of the eight games over the weekend went under the total points line and the tone was set on Thursday night when the Roosters and Broncos went under their number of 40.5… only just.
That’s the second time that the Broncos have had a game go under by a mere half point and the third time in four games overall.
Quite a few games would have had overs bettors cursing their fortune as some games didn’t even go close to the number.
The Panthers-Tigers game totalling 17 points didn’t get close to its 37.5 number while the Knights and Dragons game had 25 points also well short of the 39.5 total in that game.
Perhaps the cruellest under however came in Saturday’s first game as the Rabbitohs, who had gone over in their first three games were held to just 12 points by Manly and the game went well below its 43.5 point total.
4 – Perfect No More?
Just two teams remain in the perfect race, the Storm are unbeaten head to head while the Titans are still chasing their first win of the season.
Of course that is head to head but what we’re talking about here is how the teams are going against the spread.
After two rounds, there were just four teams with a 2-0 record and going into this weekend, only the Storm remained as the lone unbeaten team against the spread.
Expected to demolish the Bulldogs, the Storm game went right down to the wire and while they still picked up the two competition points, they missed the -16.5 line by a lot.
At the other end of the table, every team has been able to cover the spread at least once.
5 – Saturday Night Feature
There’s a lot of competition for your attention on Saturday night and Sharks-Roosters puts forward a pretty good case for the NRL to take centre stage.
Can the Roosters back up from their massive win over the Broncos or will there be a letdown as they take on a side they have won their last three against?
They have managed to win and cover as favourites in all three games since their opening round defeat at the hands of the Rabbitohs while the Sharks have flashed this season but showed some vulnerability going down to the Eels last weekend.