Can Lomax be considered as a starter? Will Mulitalo continue his try scoring steak? Can Timoko return to his early season form? There were so many questions coming out of round 18 and some of them were answered in round 19. But let's turn our attention back to fantasy footy for a second and identify some risers in form and others who should be falling out of favor with all fantasy coaches. Let us know your thoughts on who we have down below on all of our social channels: twitter, facebook, instagram, discord.
RISERS
Zac Lomax – CTR, St George Illawarra Dragons (109 points)
Lomax had a career game against the Raiders, but it wasn’t enough to get the Red V the win. In this performance he came away with 2 tries, 3 goals, 1 try assist, 2 line break assists, 11 tackle breaks and 1 offload on attack, this came to 76 points. He also earned himself 36 points through tackles and running metres, these are great base stats for a centre. Prior to this game Lomax had been showing a bit of form over his last 4 games and averaged 43 points over this period. This is pretty good considering the Dragons only won one of these games. When we have a full slate of games to select centres from, Lomax usually doesn’t enter the selection conversation due to the Dragons poor form and the struggles they have on attack. Up until round 9, Lomax was playing at left centre where he averaged 32 points. Since shifting back to his preferred right centre position, he has averaged 51 points. After this sort of a performance, Lomax now enters the centre roulette game we play every week.
Matthew Timoko – CTR, Canberra Raiders (82 points)
Another centre that was in sublime form this week was Timoko. In the first half he was making line breaks and tackle breaks for fun against the Dragons left edge. In one of the final plays of the first half, he did pick a knock to his knee and many GDS coaches would have been relieved to see him return for the second half. In this performance he came away with 2 tries, 3 line breaks, 6 tackle breaks and 1 offload on attack, this came to 52 points. Like Lomax, Timoko also provided coaches with some great points in base as he ran for 222 metres and made 6 tackles. To finish off the season the Raiders have 4 games against teams inside the top 6 and 3 games against teams in the bottom 4. Like most centres, Timoko is matchup dependent. After looking at the Raiders draw, he might only be up for consideration for a few of his remaining games.
Mitchell Barnett – EDG, New Zealand Warriors (80 points)
Barnett had his best game in Warriors colors and hopefully this is a sign of more things to come for GDS coaches. In this performance he came away with 2 tries, 3 line breaks and 4 tackle breaks on attack, this came to 44 points. He also provided a very good base of 47 points through running metres and tackles. Barnett isn’t really the sort of edge I personally like to play as he doesn’t play the 80 minutes. He averages 59 minutes with a PPM of .70. The Warriors have some good forwards and I can’t really see him earning himself an 80 minute role in their current rotation. If he was to earn himself an 80 minute role, a PPM of .70 would give him an average of 56 points. We saw this week the upside he can offer, and Barnett is a player to keep your eye on in case his situation changes.
FALLERS
Ronaldo Mulitalo – WFB, Cronulla Sharks (0 points)
Mulitalo had a great matchup against the Wests Tigers but let down a lot of GDS coaches as he failed to register a single point. The Sharks tended to favour their right attacking edge this week and Mulitalo hardly saw the ball. When he did, he wasn’t able to do much with it. He only ran for 90 metres, broke 2 tackles, and made 4 errors. Due to the inconsistency of wingers, I don’t think Mulitalo will make it into my starting side for the rest of the season. Even though the Sharks are the best attacking team in the NRL, I think there are better boom or bust wingers that can start ahead of Mulitalo.
Will Penisini – CTR, Parramatta Eels (12 points)
Over the last month, Penisini has been rocks or diamonds. From round 15 he has had scores of 42, 18, 64 and 12. This week he burned the coaches that selected him but will likely remain on the list of centres we play centre roulette with. He didn’t have a terrible game with ball in hand and made 20 points through running metres and tackles. The only attacking stats he managed this week was 4 tackle breaks. With the likes of Moses, Gutherson and Brown being unavailable, the Eels were likely to struggle on attack. He lost 20 points through missed tackles and errors and as coaches we never like to see this. If you have his card, I wouldn’t go selling him as he’s only 20 years old and he does have a bright future. If you don’t have him and need to add to your centre depth, it might pay to check out the Transfer Market (TM) and see if you can find any deals.
Jarrod Croker – CTR, Canberra Raiders (4 points)
Croker has had a fantastic NRL career and has been fantasy relevant in the past, but it looks like those days are behind him. Averaging 32 points on the season with a top score of 55, this week was easily his worst performance of the season. Against the Dragons rampant right edge of Lomax and Ravalawa, Croker looked very exposed. He missed 9 tackles, made 2 errors, and gave away 1 penalty for a total of 41 demerits. If it wasn’t for his goal kicking, he would have finished with negative points. He may have the occasional good game in fantasy terms left in him but with only one score of 50+ this season, I think there are far better centres that could be starting in your side.