Champion (Anti) PODs: Unique players to find an edge

• QUANTIUM STAT ANALYSIS: Vital numbers to beat the best, Round 8
• SQUAD BREAKDOWN: SuperCoach team insights, Round 8

I thought that this week while everyone deals with the obvious fullback dilemmas that we all currently face, it might be a good idea to steer clear of that conversation as it has already been heavily discussed on many a podcast and article across the SuperCoach community.

Instead, I will focus on a topic that many people are currently somewhat sleeping on, and that is the elusive anti-POD conundrum.

Obviously this is a very delicate topic, and it can really cause your season to crash and burn if you anti-POD the wrong players, so apologies in advance if you take my advice on any of these and that ends up the case.

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On the flipside however, if you can nail the right anti-POD it can go an exceptionally long way towards having a genuine shot at the title or finishing in the top 1,000 or whatever your goal may be.

The first guy I want to bring up will probably surprise everyone because he really is a SuperCoach stud and always will be, however sitting at $583k and at 28.6% ownership is Angus Crichton (86% owned by the top 100 ranked teams), and he currently averages under 70 in an extremely highly contested 2RF position this year.

With Luke Keary out for the season the Roosters obviously had to have a massive shakedown in their halves by bringing in Drew Hutchison and Sam Walker – this has not been good for Angus’ attacking output which he heavily relies on to get those elite 80-90+ scores.

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My theory revolves around the idea that whilst Sam Walker has obviously been outstanding in his opening few games, he tends to throw way more cut-out passes to his centres and wingers as opposed to Keary who would turn back inside into Angus and put him over for some easy tries.

Furthermore, Angus has accumulated many points in the past from the middle third of the field where he busts a tackle or two and gets an offload away to someone running off him (normally Teddy).

This year teams are locking up his ball carrying arm which has massively decreased his offload count and ability to produce LBAs at will like he has in the past.

All things aside I think Angus will be a keeper for the run home, but I really don’t mind a cheeky early trade to Tohu Harris well in advance of the bye rounds and State of Origin to get a jump on the rest of the competition.

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Next up we have Kurt Capewell who astonishingly still sits at over 30% ownership and is barely scraping a 60 average even with four tries to his name!

The other concern for Capewell is that he is not getting the 80 minute games which he desperately needs when playing in the edge back-row position.

There are some seriously dynamic CTW mega high upside guys emerging like Alex Johnston, Maika Sivo and Corey Thompson who I would trade in for Capewell in a heartbeat.

Jayden Brailey is the next player I deem worthy of anti-POD potential. He has been solid as a rock so far and seems to have a solid floor of around 65 based on his immense tackle rate, but as we know SuperCoach is evolving into a game where ceilings are more important than floors, and I just don’t think Brailey has the ceiling to cut it in a highly coveted hooker position.

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The first few rounds this season he was running the ball close to the line and putting some of the big forwards over for try-assists, however now that Kalyn Ponga is back in the team the Knights game plan has totally changed, and this will take away a significant amount of Brailey’s try-assist potential.

Granted he is a tough trade out especially given he plays the bye, but with guys like Reed Mahoney, Harry Grant and Jake Simpkins all primed and looking much more likely for higher upside I think Brailey can be moved on and comfortably death ridden for the remainder of the season having already done his job for owners over the last seven rounds.

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Our final anti-POD is Daine Laurie. I was very hesitant to put him on this list because I still believe he has potential to be a CTW keeper and he also plays the first bye round too.

Owned by a whopping 62.5% of SuperCoaches, Laurie is averaging 54.6 so far, consisting of three tries and five linebreaks which is by all means pretty good for the CTW position.

The concern is that his highest score so far is just 73, which just won’t cut it when you have guys capable of going 150 in the CTW like Sivo did last week.

With the bye still a fair few weeks away I don’t mind shipping on Laurie early for an out and out gun with more upside and Sivo seems to be the glaringly obvious choice.