General Warriors Need To Get Tough And Be Boring

[Play The Ball]

Play The Ball submitted a new Article:

Warriors Need To Get Tough And Be Boring

The Warriors will miss the NRL finals for the fourth straight year after a free-fall out of the top four over the past few weeks.

As is always the case with a side that misses out on achieving goals, thought and planning is already starting to turn to next season and I hope the new administration, led by Jim Doyle, will pick up the lessons that seemed to have been missed in recent years.

The Warriors don’t need to add any more attacking players to their mix – in fact they probably need to offload some. On paper, if you gave every player in the competition, an individual mark out of 10, the Warriors might have a side that adds up to a top eight side. But in reality, despite some serious natural ability, they are a side that lacks balance and polish.

With Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Issac Luke heading to Auckland next season to link up with 2014 Golden Boot winner Shaun Johnson, the Warriors have in their spine three of the sport’s premier attacking players. They don’t need to add more attacking weaponry to be a title contender. What they need is to provide those three players the platform and the supporting cast that will allow them to play to their potential. That means a forward pack that goes forward without dropping the ball and that is mobile and structured well enough to earn at least parity in the play-the-ball. It means they need outside backs that don’t have a tendency to drop the ball, give away penalties or are prone to defensive lapses.

A pack containing skipper Simon Mannering, hard-working back-rowers like Ryan Hoffman and Bodene Thompson and a couple of go-forward props like Ben Matulino and Jacob Lillyman is a good start. Add in promising rookies like Sam Lisone and Albert Vete and you go a long way to having one of the better packs in the competition. But depth here is needed. The Warriors look under-strength up front when Matulino in particular is off the field. Lisone and Vete, naturally go through lulls in form, as is normally the case with young forwards. An extra couple of slightly-better than average first grade forwards would make a real difference.

With Johnson and Tuivasa-Sheck the obvious danger men in the back-line, the Warriors need a couple of centres to help the side get their sets going out of dummy half early in the count and some players that will tighten up arguably the worst red zone defensive side in the competition. The likes of Jonathan Wright, Ken Maumalo and David Fusitua are capable wingers but a couple of...

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[jonno]

Warriors need to start playing as a team. They need to start turning up for each other on the field. Even the lady who cuts my hair reckons that's the problem...

Enough of the do it yourself attitude. That's what's getting boring and driving the fans away....

 

[wallacenz]

Agree with the article, not the heading. The Warriors already have the dial set to boring, 1 linebreak in a whole game isn't that exciting. Without Shaun Johnson this team has no attack, and without Thompson running off his shoulder even Shaun Johnson struggles unless he manufactures a linebreak himself.

 

[gREVUS]

disagree they are already boring and its not paying off for them. I would prefer to watch the old warriors, the excitement machine that neither you nor anyone else knew what was coming next, but it was sure to be a rollercoaster of excitement and fun. They could slay any giant, anywhere, anytime. And then would fold to minnows just to prove they were totally unpredictable. Anything but the shit weve been watching for the last 3 years.

 

[Play The Ball]

disagree they are already boring and its not paying off for them. I would prefer to watch the old warriors, the excitement machine that neither you nor anyone else knew what was coming next, but it was sure to be a rollercoaster of excitement and fun. They could slay any giant, anywhere, anytime. And then would fold to minnows just to prove they were totally unpredictable. Anything but the shit weve been watching for the last 3 years.

While I understand what you're saying it is that attitude that will prevent this club from ever winning a premiership. Winning's winning. And winning teams will get crowds.

 

[mt.wellington]

2002 we were tough as hell. Exciting too. Theres no reason why the two cant go hand in hand...

 

[Far Away Fan]

2002 we were tough as hell. Exciting too. Theres no reason why the two cant go hand in hand...

Yes.

disagree they are already boring and its not paying off for them. I would prefer to watch the old warriors, the excitement machine that neither you nor anyone else knew what was coming next, but it was sure to be a rollercoaster of excitement and fun. They could slay any giant, anywhere, anytime. And then would fold to minnows just to prove they were totally unpredictable. Anything but the shit weve been watching for the last 3 years.

Yes again.

Being exciting and entertaining and totally unpredictable is the one of the two reasons why I started to follow the Warriors.. (The other being they are the NZ team, of course.)

If I wanted to support a team like the Storm, I'd support the Storm.

Being boring is bad enough. But wanting to be boring? Er...hello?

 

[jonno]

What is it that makes for an exciting game? Strong defense and slick passing... Or in other words.... teamwork...

Watching the AB's turn up for each other again and again, then turning over to the Warriors and it's blatantly obvious that they aren't looking after each other out there.. It's every man for them self....

A guy is falling to the ground and decides to try and make himself look good with a high risk off load. If it fails and dribbles forward and it's forgotten in a couple of weeks, but if it goes to hand and there's a try scored it's on the highlights reel forever...

But if these guys had worked out their combinations at training they could use high percentage plays and stick the passed 95% of the time...

There's a major lack of goodwill inside the camp.... No business can survive under these circumstances... That's why we're all getting bored with these children...

Doyle needs to institute a recruitment policy that ensures the whole team are friends (not Nathen Friends lol) with each other... otherwise what's the fucken point..

 

[facefacts]

Yes.



Yes again.

Being exciting and entertaining and totally unpredictable is the one of the two reasons why I started to follow the Warriors.. (The other being they are the NZ team, of course.)

If I wanted to support a team like the Storm, I'd support the Storm.

Being boring is bad enough. But wanting to be boring? Er...hello?

I dont think it's about playing boring football, because lets face it, no team will be boring with Shaun Johnson, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck, Luke and Lolohea in the side...i think it's about prioritizing what people consider the boring part of the game over attack, it's about having the ability to play that sort of of footy when needed, particularly in the big games where you have to just stay in it without beating yourself until you get that one chance to win it...something the Warriors dont have the ability to do with anything close to consistency.

As for the rest of the article...i all seems strangely familiar for some reason.

 

[Jordan G]

The one thing the Warriors need to get is smart.