Foran and Warriors find the answers against depleted Broncos

The Warriors remain outside the top eight, but the pressure on everyone at the club was eased after the 28-10 win over the Broncos on Saturday night.

The Broncos may have been missing six players because of State of Origin duty, but it was just the type of victory the team needed after dreadful losses to the Panthers and Dragons the previous two weeks.

Kieran Foran revealed they wanted to strip everything back against the Broncos and he and Shaun Johnson in the halves were helped by good performances from the forwards.

‘‘We’ve been searching for answers, but we probably just peeled it back a few layers this week, went right back to the basics,’’ Foran said.

‘‘We spoke about the fact that

we wanted to tackle and run hard, you do those two things well across the park and you give yourself every opportunity of win-

ning.’’

During their down patch, there was never any drop off in how how Foran played, but the Broncos

game showed how much more he can do when the forwards are winning the battle up the middle.

‘‘If you’re playing quick through the middle of the field, leaving their guys on the ground and get one guy at marker, you can really dominate that middle third of the park,’’ Foran said. ’’That’s been a big focus point for us this week and I was glad we were able to capitalise on it and score some points off the back of it.’’

The Warriors are always supposed to go well during the Origin period, just like they’re supposed to start slowly and collapse at the end of the season.

While they may want to change the latter of those traits, at least they’re on track with the Origin one.

‘‘The last two weeks have been difficult for us,’’ Foran said. ’’We hadn’t played to our standards and there have been a few tough, hard conversations that have needed to take place.

‘‘It was good to walk off the field knowing everyone put in a really good team performance and played strongly for one and other.’’

As ever when the Warriors aren’t going well, the heat goes on Johnson. He admitted in the build up to the Broncos game that he hadn’t been playing well and took responsibility for how the team had been tracking.

But Foran didn’t feel the fault lied with his halves partner.

‘‘I’ve spent a lot of time with Shaun this year and I know that the last couple of weeks have really hurt him,’’ he said. ’’I didn’t think he’s been that bad, he’s been really trying, his effort has been great in every game.

‘‘The execution sometimes wasn’t there, but you can’t knock the bloke’s effort and he went out there with a real intent of wanting to turn things around for this club and you can see how much that meant to him.

‘‘He’s going to be the key man for us if we’re going to go deep into this competition, we need Shaun firing on all cylinders and if he can keep building on what he did [against the Broncos], then that’s going to be great for this side.’’

The Warriors travel to Parramatta to play the Eels on Friday and will try to address their dreadful form away from Mt Smart Stadium.

They have lost all six games away from their usual home venue this season, but Foran admits he doesn’t know why they haven’t been as good on the road.

‘‘It’s something we’re searching for answers for ourselves,’’ he said.

‘‘We’re doing everything right, we’re so professional in our travel.

‘‘That’s something I’ve noticed since coming here, that they get everything right, so I’m not too sure why we haven’t been able to win away from here.

‘‘But we can start that on Friday, we’ve got a big against Parramatta, we’ll freshen up and hopefully we’ll keep building.’’