Blair: ‘No pressure, we’re on a journey’
Hey ref
Captain Adam Blair insists there is no pressure on the Kiwis to match Tonga by putting 50 points on Scotland in today’s Rugby League World Cup clash in Christchurch.
Tonga thumped the Scots 50-4 in Cairns last Sunday - a day after the Kiwis’ 38-8 win over Samoa.
Scotland are at $31 odds to score an upset against the Kiwis at AMI Stadium - and New Zealand fans will be expecting some razzle dazzle from the home team after Tonga turned on nine tries.
A big victory would give the Kiwis’ faithful some confidence ahead of next week’s game against Jason Taumalolo’s Tonga -a match that should decide the Pool B winner and top seed for the playoffs.
But asked if the Kiwis felt any pressure to replicate Tonga’s performance and scoreline against Scotland, Blair said: ‘‘Not in particular.
‘‘We are on our own little journey here, our team ... We can’t control what other teams are doing, we’ve just got to make sure we nail our performances, week in and week out.’’
The Warriors-bound forward said the Kiwis’ focus was to ‘‘just perform at the best level we can and prepare well, week week out’’.
‘‘It’s all about being better ... we weren’t at our best against Samoa, we made a lot of errors and this is stepping stone towards where we want to go.
‘‘Once we start getting deeper into the competition, the competition gets harder, so we need to make sure every time we do turn up on the field we’re [getting] better from the previous game ...’’
Blair believes a lot of the Kiwis’ struggles against the Samoans - in particular their disappointing 62 per cent completion rate - could be quickly overcome.
‘‘Yes, we did drop a lot of ball in our last game, [so] it’s about making sure we execute our plays. Some of them were just individual handling errors - maybe an offload here and there that should have been held. Those things can be easily fixed - we fix those things up we complete really high and we give ourselves every chance.’’
The Kiwis have made seven changes after resting big guns
Comes into the side at five-eighth after coach David Kidwell opted for Kodi Nikorima against Samoa first-up. After a mid-year move from the Panthers to the Cowboys, Martin was in tremendous form in North Queensland’s run to the grand final, scoring off a memorable individual effort in the preliminary final against the Roosters then also managing to cross in the decider. Despite Nikorima doing well, a big performance here could potentially get Martin a berth against Tonga next week.
Simon Mannering, Jordan Rapana and Thomas Leuluai.
Yet all 17 players are NRL regulars whereas the Scots have just a few fringe players from Australasian clubs and a bunch of English Super League and Championship second tier stalwarts.
The Scots do have significant World Cup experience - head coach Steve McCormack and captain Danny Brough have been in those roles for three tournaments.
Brough believed Scotland could ‘‘take heart’’ from last year’s 18-18 draw with the Kiwis in a Four Nations tournament game in England, which he hailed as ‘‘the best [result] in our history’’.
‘‘Hopefully, we can try and repeat a bit of that form we showed last year.’’
He admitted they would have to play a lot better than ‘‘the very poor result’’ against Tonga where the Scots’ skills were found wanting.
The Huddersfield Giants standoff half said Scotland would not be going out to ‘‘minimise damage’’ because they had a lot of belief and,’’hopefully we can achieve it’’.
McCormack said the Scots were not here to merely earn respect. ‘‘We want to do well and we want
The veteran prop provides The Bravehearts some experience and ruggedness in the middle. The 31-year- old racked up 263 NRL appearances in his time at the Sharks ( 2006-2011) then the Titans ( 2012-2016), is coming off a first Super League season with St Helens, and is playing in his second World Cup for Scotland.
to win.’’ He cautioned that the 2016 game in Workington was ‘‘12 months ago this week’’ and Scotland now had ‘‘a totally different team’’.
The Wigan Warriors player welfare officer - who has coached Scotland since 2004 - was impressed with the Kiwis against Samoa and thought they looked ‘‘a very organised team that’s playing with smiles on their faces’’.