Warriors nil as Knights charge
The Warriors have gone down 20-0 to the Knights in a wet and windy Newcastle to start their NRL season on a sour note. It is the first time Stephen Kearney has lost the opening game of a season as Warriors coach, with Kalyn Ponga scoring 12 of the Knights’ points.
Just before this game began, Prime Minister Jacinda Arden announced that anyone arriving in New Zealand from midnight Sunday would have to self isolate for 14 days.
That’s a decision which will have major implications on the Warriors season but it’s likely the players knew nothing about it when they took to the field.
But what should have given them a lift was the news that their captain Roger Tuivasa-Sheck was fit to play, having recovered from the ankle injury picked up in a trial game two weeks ago.
One change to the team was King Vuniyayawa making his debut from the bench, coming into the 17 for Karl Lawton.
While only so much can be read into the first game of the season, the Warriors will need to fix up a number areas of their game.
(Daniel Saifiti, Edrick Lee, Kalyn Ponga tries; Ponga 4 goals) 10-0.
Defensively it wasn’t brilliant, but on attack they never got anything going and so many attacks were ruined by errors.
They had back to back sets close to the Knights line over the first seven minutes, but could not break the defence.
Then in the ninth minute the Knights showed how to make the most of territory, with Daniel Saifiti ripping down the middle of the field to get the opening try.
The Knights got their second try 10 minutes later when space opened up on the left edge for the big winger Edrick Lee to breeze through.
In the 20th minute Chanel Harris-Tavita was sent to the bin for being offside. It was the eighth penalty the Warriors had given away already and this game was beginning to look like a disaster.
A 40/20 from Blake Green with 13 minutes in the half to go got the Warriors back on the front foot, but nothing came of it, with the recently returned Harris-Tavita giving the ball away with a poor grubber kick.
But credit to the Warriors, they didn’t crumble after the poor start. Execution was lacking and they didn’t make the most of playing with a strong wind behind them in the first half.
Ponga kicked two penalties early in the second half to make it a 14-0 game, with the Warriors again guilty of ill discipline.
The star fullback then scored a try in the 54th minute, latching onto a kick from Mitchell Pearce.
From then on the game was as good as over and while the Warriors were able to get into the red zone, there were more mistakes and bad options taken.
The Knights ended up being just as pleased with keeping the Warriors scoreless as they were in scoring 20 points themselves and while they can be optimistic about their season, worries must be mounting already for Kearney’s team.
‘‘I thought there was some pretty good parts to it,’’ said Kearney. ‘‘I thought the lads tried really hard, a couple of tries came off kicks they had and we probably gave away too much position in terms of penalties, particularly in the first half there when we had the strong breeze behind us. I thought the group tried really hard, we probably just didn’t put it in the right places at times. So that’s an improvement for us this week.
‘‘The Knights did a really good job defensively, we couldn’t gain any momentum. That’s a credit to them and we’ve just got to be better at that.’’
Knights 20
Warriors 0. HT: