The delightful win for New Zealand Warriors vs Brisbane Broncos featured important contributions from the young wave of NRL Warriors and it capped off a Saturday in which the Jersey Flegg Cup and NSW Cup teams won with lots of emerging talent on display.
New Zealand Women Warriors added another play-maker to their 2025 NRLW roster in Patricia Maliepo and still have a few spots available in their NRLWahine squad.
A young wave has already swept through Mt Smart to refresh the New Zealand Warriors NRL team in 2025 and after five rounds of NSW Cup footy, there is a clear group of emerging talent on rising towards the NRL.
New Plymouth's Mawene Hiroti is been patiently waiting for a decent opportunity at Cronulla Sharks and with an unfortunate injury lay off for Arorangi junior Kayal Iro, that opportunity has come at left centre this season.
Tyrone Thompson joined twin brother Leo as the starting props for Newcastle Knights in their loss to Wests Tigers which means there have been five Kiwi-NRL debuts in six rounds this season.
New Zealand Warriors play against Storm in Melbourne on Sunday while the NSW Cup and Jersey Flegg Cup teams are playing in Auckland against their Newtown/Sharks on Saturday.
Sean Mullany came off the bench for Gold Coast Titans in their loss vs Dolphins to make his NRL debut and become the fourth Kiwi-NRL debutant in 2025 after five rounds of footy.
Moses Leo added himself to the Kiwi-NRL debut list with his late call up to the Melbourne Storm team who defeated Manly Sea Eagles.
New Zealand Warriors responded to their first up loss with three wins in a row and are now enjoying Aotearoa's rain in a bye round.
New Zealand Warriors have their first NRL game of the season in Australia on Sunday night when the play Wests Tigers in Sydney.
Mt Smart was rocking once again with New Zealand Warriors grabbing their second Friday night win in a row to start the 2025 NRL season.
New Zealand Warriors bounced back with a win vs Sea Eagles at Mt Smart and shuffle into another Friday night home game against Roosters.
Bayleigh Bentley-Hape made his NRL debut for South Sydney Rabbitohs in their win over St George Illawara Dragons, which makes the Moerewa junior the second Kiwi-NRL debutant in two rounds of footy this season.
New Zealand Warriors are back on home turf with a Friday night game vs Manly Sea Eagles and after a lacklustre performance in a distant land, they need to find some juice at the temple of Mt Smart.
Salesi Foketi is the first Kiwi-NRL debutant of the 2025 NRL season after coming off the bench for Sydney Roosters in their round one loss vs Brisbane Broncos.
For the second year in a row, New Zealand Warriors started their season with an underwhelming performance after spending the whole summer training harder and smarter than ever before.
New Zealand Warriors start their 2025 NRL season vs Canberra Raiders in a distant land and in the two seasons of the two Andys era, results in the first game have set the tone for how that season unfolds.
Despite losing a couple games in the 2024 Pacific Championships, Aotearoa Kiwis have built out a strong pool of players who have international rugby league experience and have more than enough depth to cover any eligibility quirks.
There are a few notable Kiwi-NRL selections to check in with as pre-season winds down such as Te Hurinui Twidle getting a crack in the halves for Parramatta Eels and former New Zealand Schools rugby union player Tevita Naufahu sticking around the Dolphins squad.
New Zealand Warriors have played two pre-season games with a 12-12 draw vs Cronulla Sharks and a 36-10 win vs Melbourne Storm, offering plenty of funky wrinkles to digest before the NRL season starts.