They have lost their last two matches by a combined 68-12 and face in-form Manly and last season’s grand-finalists Melbourne and Penrith over the final four rounds of the 2021 NRL regular season.
But Parramatta Eels boss Brad Arthur called for calm in the aftermath of his Friday’s 40-12 loss to premiership contenders South Sydney on the Gold Coast.
“The last couple of games, yeah, we haven’t been good but we can’t panic,” Arthur said.
“We’ve done a lot of work early to get ourselves in a reasonable position but we just need to work out what we need to do and get right for next week.”
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Parramatta trailed Wayne Bennett’s men 32-0 before Maika Sivo opened the Eels’ account with a try in the 55th minute.
It was a meek response to last Thursday’s 28-0 loss to the Sydney Roosters and Arthur had few answers at his post-match press conference.
“It’s disappointing, the boys are disappointed but they just outplayed us, they were too good, simple as that,” Arthur said.
“They controlled the field position, they iced their plays when they needed to and they’re playing full of confidence and things work.
“We’re just down a bit on confidence I think.”
Despite the loss the Eels remain in fourth position on the ladder but could fall as low as sixth if the Roosters and Sea Eagles both win this weekend.
Asked if the Eels can no longer make finish in the top four and earn a second chance in the finals series, Arthur replied: “No, no, there’s still four weeks to go but we can’t be worrying about the top-four finish at the moment, we’ve got to worry about getting some football back on that we know that we need to be playing and find our rhythm again.
A suspected season-ending shoulder injury to hooker Reed Mahoney added further misery for Eels fans.
The No.9 was distraught after being forced from the field after damaging the shoulder that saw him miss a month of football earlier in the season in a heavy Latrell Mitchell tackle.
“Initially we don’t think it’s great but he’ll have to go and get scans tomorrow,” Arthur said.
“It could be the end of him for the year but we won’t know that until probably tomorrow.”
Meanwhile, Arthur defended the decision to play Mitchell Moses after the half-back appeared to be hampered by back fractures suffered playing for NSW last month.
“No it wasn’t a risk … I think he was OK,” Arthur said of Moses.
“There’s plenty of guys at this time of year playing with a little bit of pain but he was fine in the sheds, he never complained to our trainers once about it so I don’t think that’s an issue.”
