Warriors must keep improving, says McFadden

The quality of the opposition might not be as good for the Warriors on Saturday, but Andrew McFadden wants the team to keep going in the same direction.

The 19-18 loss to the Sharks in Cronulla on Saturday brought to an end the club’s three-game winning streak in the NRL, while extending the Sharks’ to 11.

This Saturday they take on the Titans at Mt Smart Stadium, a team that like the Warriors have won seven and lost eight games this season and are on the fringes of the top eight.

In many ways, it’s more important that the Warriors win this game more than last weekend’s one and the Warriors coach wants the team to continue making improvements.

‘‘I was very proud, but we can’t be satisfied,’’ said McFadden.

‘‘It was a good test, everyone said it would give us a good indication of where we sit and what it shows us is that we’re still short and we’ve got to get better.

‘‘We’ve got to keep building,’’ McFadden added. ‘‘That’s got to be the benchmark for us, the minimum standard and that’s what we’re trying to do.’’

Simon Mannering and Shaun Johnson sat out training on Tuesday, to give them extra time to recover from the Sharks game, but both trained yesterday.

‘‘That’s more to do with the nature of the game last weekend, both of those guys had some huge numbers,’’ McFadden said.

The Titans, along with the Knights, were tipped to be the side battling for the wooden spoon this year. While those predictions about the Knights have been correct, the Titans have done better than expected and they’ve played an attractive brand of footy, similar to the Warriors, where they look for offloads and try to keep the ball alive.

‘‘People make predictions every year and generally they don’t get it right,’’ McFadden said.

‘‘This game is so close and the competition is so tight, teams can rise and teams can fall.

‘‘The Titans are showing a bit more and they’re a quality side.

‘‘They’re a really highly skilled side and play with the footy a lot. They’re not dissimilar to us, play with a lot of offloads and second phase.’’