The Serve

Ray Warren: Defence again wins for Souths

Today we saw was a very different South Sydney side with the ball. But make no mistake, the Rabbitohs again built a victory on their defence.

Souths have found it hard to score tries, in fact they’re ranked 16th in attack. I’m in a state of shock at what I saw today.

Their defence frustrates the opposition. That certainly happened with the Tigers. They were pushing passes that didn’t need to be thrown.

It’s ironic that Jason Taylor has reverted to his original halves of Joe Williams and Jeremy Smith, albeit in reversedpositions. It was only a few weeks ago that Taylor said Williams had to be removed because he was taking all the wrong options. Today, every option he took was perfect. Williams was briilliant.

The Tigers have a tendency to switch off and not be ‘up’ for games, but that wasn’t the case today. Robbie Farah’s injury was big, very big, however it was the domino effect of not being able to crack that resolute Rabbitohs defence that hurt them today.