Had Aotearoa Warriors won that game vs Cronulla Sharks, most likely by a single point, we could have chucked it in the gritty 'find a way to win' bucket. To snare one of those type of wins against a team who epitomise that style of footy, would have been a fabulous effort given the circumstances as it became clear that this wasn't going to be one of the sublime Warriors performances we hope for in 2018.

The circumstances of the Denver Test played a role, as did a cold and moist evening game against a team who are experts in slugging it out. Outside of spluttering moments, the Warriors were pretty crap and youz all know that I'm all about the positive energies, so for me to highlight Warriors crappiness is noteworthy. Sometimes my positivity can border on offering up excuses and this time there are plenty of excuses on offer, from the scheduling to the referees, perhaps more excuses than usual; none of which were the biggest factors in a Warriors loss.

I could say that the Warriors were blown out of the game, conceding 10 penalties to the Sharks 5. That feels more like an example of how everything in this game pushed the Warriors into a slow, grinding game against the Sharks and I must reinforce the fact that the Sharks love that - it's their schtick. With a penalty count like that, the Warriors obviously had less possession and made more tackles. 

If I am to throw up one more stat, the stat that tells the real story of this game it's forced drop outs; 0 vs 4. Shaun Johnson and Blake Green didn't earn a repeat set, not a single drop out and this not only meant that the Warriors dabbled in 'good ball' attack - they went down the

Sharks end, fired a shot and then gapped it - thus limiting how effective the Warriors could be in scoring points and controlling the game, it is also evidence of an overall poor kicking game.
Now, in their last outing vs Cowboys, the Warriors won the game via their kicking game, so there is no need to get your knickers in a twist. If Johnson and Green rolled out a similar execution with their kicks vs Sharks, they win the game. Instead, Valentine Holmes caught everything on the full and the Sharks controlled the game through territory.

In other games, against different opposition, on a different day of the year, that might be all good. Going set for set, grinding it out against the Sharks and losing the territory battle, ain't going to work out for you. 

There were signs that it could have worked out for the Warriors as a Johnson grubber in the second half pegged the Sharks into a corner, then the Warriors attacked with their defence and forced a mistake from Andrew Fifita. Then the Warriors scored points. The Warriors can do that, they are multi-faceted in how they can dominate their opposition but you can only control a game with your defence if Johnson and Green are controlling the game with their boots - as we saw in Townsville.

Metres up the guts can play a role in that as the halves need time and space. Cronulla obviously ran for more metres because they had more runs, but the Warriors, without Ken Maumalo and David Fusitua averaged 9.31m/run while the Sharks averaged 8.18m/run.
And they almost niggled their way to a win without Adam Blair, who would have loved this game. 

There was no real need for the Warriors to play into the Sharks hands by slowing the game down, not moving the ball around and playing their game. They scored two tries early on either edge and when Jazz Tevaga came on, he offered the funk required to shift the Sharks defence around (he also made the tackle of Fifita to force the error). There were patches in this game when the Warriors did what they wanted and it worked, but the crappiness sits in how they went into grindy footy and were then unable to execute.

Maybe that's the big takeaway for the Warriors as they were kinda playing their footy and kinda playing Sharks footy. The Sharks obviously went all in on Sharks footy and won. It would have been bloody nice to find a way to win, but the Sharks are better at that than the Warriors and that may not necessarily be a bad thing.

Hit an ad to support the Diary Of An Aotearoa Warriors Fan.

Or jump on Patreon and support the Niche Cache directly, we drop bonus stuff for the Patrons and take care of the homies.

Peace and love 27.