Predicted Finish: 3rd
Actual Finish: 3rd
The Eels finished exactly where I expected. They were just outside the true elite of the competition but more than good enough to finish in the top four. They entered the season with heavy expectations and I'd say they delivered.
- Defensive Steel: With all due respect to recent Eels outfits, I'm not sure they've exactly been thought of as defensive specialists. In 2020 they largely bossed opposition attacks, conceding on 288 points across 20 regular season games at just over 14 per game. Even when their attack stuttered, they were able to get home on the back of their stingy defence. They beat opposition forward packs down in the middle and their wide men held their positions and rarely folded. They say Premierships are built on defence. Only the Storm and Panthers, the Grand Finalists, conceded less.
- Powerful start to the season: The Eels ended 2019 in horror fashion, yet started 2020 like a locomotive, winning their first five games. Those wins included a 46-6 win over the Titans, a 34-6 win over the Broncos and then wins over the Eagles and Panthers. That was the only loss in the regular season that the Panthers would endure. For the record they also beat the Dogs in round one. They would end up winning eight of their opening ten games, which hugely set them up for a return to the top four.
- Metre Eaters: The Eels were extremely hard to contain in 2020. They ran for the third most amount of metres across the competition and the second most post contact metres. They also lead the offload count, by a long way with 303. The next closest was 229 by the Roosters. Junior Paulo was the comp's leading off loader whilst also featuring in the top 15 metre eaters alongside fellow Eels RCG and Clint Gutherson. Fair to say they had little trouble winning the battle metre-wise more often than not.
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- Lack of points (in comparison): It's a good thing that the Eels defence was so strong in 2020 as, at times, they struggled to find points. Over their 20 regular-season games they scored just 392 points, which was by far the lowest of the top eight sides. It's ok scoring 20 points per game when you're only conceding 14, but they only won one "shoot out" game in 2020, over the struggling Tigers. Both finals games were shoot outs (i.e. high scoring) and they were unable to win either.
- Straight sets exit: The Eels finished in the top four, which all but guarantees a Prelim. That sounds ridiculous but stats indicate you usually win one finals game if you finish in the four. They did not. Losses to the red hot Storm then the in form Bunnies are hardly the end of the world, but that's three big losses in the finals in a row now for this Eels outfit. They finished third but you never felt like they were a chance against the big boys come finals time. 36 and 38 points conceded in the finals makes for painful reading for a team who otherwise defended so well all season.
Clint Gutherson
The King reigned at Bankwest and beyond in 2020 after a magnificent season. His performances were such that he was selected for all three Origin games at centre, before moving to his preferred fullback when required in Game Three.
2020 say his cross for ten tries, lay on 17 try assists, make 12 line breaks, break 61 tackles and run for 190 metres per game. He missed three minutes in the entire season, while also playing every minute of Origin.
His season was such that he was named as the Dally M fullback of the year over the likes of Tedesco, RTS and Papenhuyzen. For the record, he was the clear choice here. That's how good he was in the 2020 regular season.
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Despite exiting the finals without a win, and on the back of conceding two large scores, no one can see this season as anything short of a huge step forward for the blue and golds.
They had moments where they looked like a genuine title threat on the back of an extremely powerful forward pack, two clever halves, a fullback in season-best form and outside backs crossing for buckets of tries.
There were a few negatives, mainly the lack of try-scoring form of Blake Ferguson and the up and down form of halfback Mitchell Moses, but overall the Eels excelled almost everywhere.
Reagan Campbell-Gillard returned to his damaging best and formed one of the competition's elite prop combinations with the off-load king Junior Paulo. Ryan Matterson delivered on everything he promised, while Nathan Brown became one of the competition's best in the 13. Throw in the monster Shaun Lane and that's one of the game's elite packs.
Brad Arthur will be frustrated with the back to back losses in the finals but will see 2020 as a big stepping stone to future success. Both Reed Mahoney and Dylan Brown stepped up, with the latter especially looking a future megastar.
The Jennings news was a real negative at the wrong end of the season but we'll leave that for another day.
A brilliant season for a side heading in the right direction. Expect the Eels to be huge players again in 2021.