NRL Odds: Eels Feeling Unlucky
January 7th, 2015 by TJ DilferNRL teams have to travel, and the NRL odds can be affected by a worse draw that will see a franchise collect more air miles than they might want. On the flip-side, of course, a better draw can mean that little bit extra recovery time between the big games, and in an incredibly tough contest like a Rugby League game, that could make all the difference.
A lot of it is common sense, of course. Australia is a big country, to start with, and there’s a team over in New Zealand to take into consideration. And the draw is always going to make some teams happier than others – that’s why there’s an element of randomness to it, and why it provokes so much debate every season. This season, one of the sides who will be cursing their luck if things don’t pan out for them is the Eels, who feel they’ll be spending more time away from Parramatta than they would like, and more time travelling in general. The Eels, looking at the NRL odds, are facing a tough battle to get themselves into the finals, and that will likely be their first ambition for the season. Eels boss Scott Seward was already on record with the NRL over the travel burden his team would face – he felt that last year’s load was too much, and he must have been disappointed when he saw the same miles in this year’s draw. He will have been particularly troubled by the run of away fixtures his team will face in Rounds 20, 21 and 22 – all of them long-haul journeys – but he’s got little choice but to get on with things, and fight his corner each time the draw comes around: ‘it’s certainly tough especially when you do volunteer to take one of your games interstate to grow the game. We will deal with it the right way. We understand how hard it is to put a draw together. We’d be negligent if we didn’t voice our concern over the travel and what it means and the welfare to our players. [Player welfare] is a massive concern for us. They aren’t one hour flights. It’s something we have to watch and monitor. We learnt plenty from this year. We will certainly put that into action again. It’s just something you have to deal with, it’s part of the game. There are interstate teams that have to travel every week. We just find it interesting that we get two years in a row where we travel to play every interstate side.’
So there look to be things that the Eels will have to overcome to make a bid for finals Rugby in 2015 – do you fancy them at odds of $3.75?
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