Does good things, needs to cut out the bloopers: Leeds Rhinos coach Brad Arthur assesses Lachie Miller
New boss Brad Arthur has given his assessment of Leeds Rhinos’ full-back Lachie Miller, insisting the Australian does some “good things”, but needs to remove “bloopers” from his game.
Miller has missed just one of Rhinos’ 19 competitive fixtures this term, scoring four tries including one in last Saturday’s 20-12 home loss to Hull KR. He tops the Betfred Super League chart for tackle busts, with 144, but has also made 21 errors, including two near Hull KR’s line early in the tackle count.
The 29-year-old’s performance was criticised by pundits on Sky Sports and giving his own assessment, Arthur –who was in charge for the first time – reflected: “He did some really good things, but then he had some things in his game which he’d like to remove.
“He is a senior player, he needs to be better than that. He did a lot of good things, we’ve just got to take out a couple of those bloopers he had which took away from his game.”
Miller joined Rhinos from Newcastle Knights in pre-season on a three-year contract. The former Cronulla Sharks man spent much of his career playing rugby union sevens and had just 19 NRL appearances to his name before linking up with Leeds.
He has produced some outstanding performances, most notably in a rain-lashed Easter win at Castleford Tigers, but inexperience in the 13-a-side code has shown at times. Arthur stressed Miller will continue in the side when Rhinos visit Huddersfield Giants tomorrow (Thursday) and is working hard on his game.
“You don’t need to take him out, because you want him in the firing line - he has done a lot of good things for us,” he said. “There’s stuff I can’t coach that he can bring to the team. There were just some detail errors about his positional play; he did a lot of moving and running last week, but wasted a lot of energy unnecessarily.
“I’ve just tidied up what he should be looking for, where he needs to start; he sometimes gets in position a bit late and is covering ground he doesn’t need to. That’s just going to be a bit of work with him around his game sense and what he is actually looking for as it unfolds.”