Everything to play for as improving Warriors begin late run at top eight
THE Warriors begin the back half of their season today against the Storm and coach Nathan Brown still believes this can be a successful campaign.
Brown’s team enter the NRL’s 14th round placed ninth on the ladder and while they haven’t looked like a team that can live with the best sides, they remain in the hunt for the top-eight playoffs.
Brown has consistently talked about how young the current squad are and he admits that inexperience was a factor at times over the first 12 games.
‘‘We’ve got a lot of younger players who are making progress,’’ Brown said.
‘‘We’ve had our fair share of setbacks on the injury and suspension front, which hasn’t helped us develop combinations, and we’ve only been able to name the same team once.
‘‘If you took the Melbourne game away [lost 42-20], in every game we’ve been in it up to our bootlaces right to the death.
‘‘So there have been a lot of exciting and close games and with a bounce of the ball or a bit of good luck we could be on 20 points, but with bad luck we could be on four or six points,’’ Brown said.
Twice this season, against the Sea Eagles and the Cowboys, the result came down to field-goal contests. In both fixtures it always looked like the Warriors were more likely to lose than win once it got to a shoot-out, and Brown acknowledges they need to do further work on this part of their game.
‘‘From a coaching point of view, it’s probably an area we need to designate a bit more time to and with the players, practising individually on striking the ball,’’ Brown said.
With the way the ladder is, it looks like the Panthers, Storm, Eels, Rabbitohs and Roosters will all finish in the top eight, while the Sea Eagles should get there too given the way Tom Trbojevic is playing.
That leaves the Warriors
Tigers king for Ken
Wests Tigers have signed Warriors and Kiwis winger Ken Maumalo, after he was granted an immediate release from the final year of his contract with the Warriors.
He has signed a two-and-a-halfyear deal after being relegated to the bench in recent weeks. Maumalo has played 105 games (41 tries) for the Warriors and 13 tests — nine under Kiwis and Tigers coach Michael Maguire. ‘‘I’ve worked closely with Ken over a number of years now and it’s great to see him now join Wests Tigers,’’ Maguire said yesterday.
battling for one of the last two spots. This team have the talent to get one of them, but they do need to find consistency, especially as they still haven’t won back-to-back games this year. ‘‘I’d like us to find some form where we can string some wins together. We’ve been in win one, lose one mode,’’ Brown said. ‘‘We’d like to put some consistent wins together. But before we do that we need to have bigger chunks of footy where we play well. All the good sides make the odd defensive mistake, but their ability to save tries is good and saving tries as a group is something we need to do better.’’