Whether you are a hearty, frothing Aotearoa Warriors fan or a kiwi sports fan sniffing around a splash of live sport, I'm not completely sure that the return of the Warriors against St George Illawara Dragons will fulfill your needs. Straight up, based on those two rounds of footy we saw earlier this year, there is an immense possibility that Saturday evening's contest could feel as underwhelming, if not more underwhelming, than those losses to Newcastle Knights and Canberra Raiders.

Bit of a bummer, yet that's how any 'Aotearoa Warriors Restart Guide' needs to begin.

Much of the following ideas have been laid out over the past weeks and months, so forgive me if you're a regular reader who knows all about various Warriors flaws. This specific dairy entry walks the line of being an educational piece for kiwi sports fans who may want to sharpen up on Warriors matters ahead of watching the game or merely sharpening up to talk some shit and there's some more fresh ideas based from the team lists and recent news.

The Warriors really did suck in those first two games of the season.

There are a bunch of different ways of slicing this for those who weren't quite tapped into Warriors matters a while back. My favourite is that the Warriors aren't actually ranked in NRL.com's team stats for tries or linebreaks, because the Warriors didn't register any of those key attacking indicators in the two games played. The Warriors had 45 percent possession vs Knights and then 52 percent vs Raiders, amounting to 57.01 total 'Time in Possession' and other than a penalty try, the Warriors barely came close to any attacking funk.

Combine that with being 3rd in missed tackles and there were signs of a team who didn't look like they trained much together in attack, then couldn't offer much resistance in terms of defence. Those were the biggest markers of Warriors depression, followed by the Warriors being 6th in handling errors and 6th in penalties conceded; not a dramatic ranking but when compounded on top of missed tackles and zero attacking impetus ... wtf.

This is a Warriors team that was led by senior players in negative stats.

Adam Blair leads the Warriors in missed tackles, Blake Green's 3rd.

Blair also leads the Warriors in errors, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck is 2nd.

Far from ideal and I also believe I saw the worst NRL games of Green's career in those first two games.

The best Warriors player in the first two games? Eliesa Katoa, playing his first two games of professional rugby league. In 2018, Katoa was at Tamaki College in Auckland and was named in the Blues Under 18 camp, in 2019 Katoa played Jersey Flegg (Under 20s) for the Warriors and making his NRL debut in 2020, Katoa completely skipped the reserve grade level after just 11 Flegg games.

Obviously that smells like an extremely talented individual who has done what the best athletes do in quickly adjusting to a higher level of that sport and improving rapidly once surrounded by a professional system. Katoa led the Warriors in post-contact-metres, 16th overall in the NRL and for context; Katoa's got more PCM than noted big boppers such as Josh Papali'i, Paul Vaughan, Tui Kamikamica, David Klemmer, Martin Taupau.

Katoa, Tuivasa-Sheck and Ken Maumalo are tied in leading the Warriors for tackle breaks.

Katoa was 2nd behind Tuivasa-Sheck for total run metres.

Keep in mind that Katoa did this playing 52 and 65 minutes, while Tuivasa-Sheck and Maumalo both played all 80 minutes.

Having a youngster like Katoa emerge so quickly is fabulous, yet this also alludes to the rest of the Warriors roster being rather meh. Perhaps working in the Warriors favour here is that the Knights and Raiders both won their first two games and resemble good NRL teams despite it being hard to truly assess teams at this stage. In neither instance though, did it feel like the Knights or Raiders were doing anything to make the Warriors look crappy and I'd suggest that it was the other way around with the Warriors making the Knights and Raiders look good.

Now we have a team list for this weekend's game against the Dragons in which Katoa is 'demoted' or 'dropped' to the bench to allow Isaiah Papali'i to start, Kodi Nikorima's in the halves, Gerard Beale's back and King Vuniyayawa is given another crack to keep some Aussies off the bench. All of which needs decoding, because coach Stephen Kearney doesn't operate in the simplest of ways.

First, it needs to be made crystal clear that I've got no idea whether the 17 named on Tuesday will be the 17 used for the game on Saturday. I'd love to see Katoa established as a starting edge forward and a Warriors team with Katoa on one edge and Tohu Harris on the other edge, both staying there for 80 minutes to build combinations and chemistry, is the best thing for the team.

Kearney has other ideas though and while Katoa may be a late move to start or whatever, based on connecting Kearney's dots about young players (Kearney outlined how it would be unsafe to let Rocco Berry play NRL with one game of Canterbury Cup rugby league experience), I suspect Kearney's perspective is looking after Katoa here. I believe Kearney has opted for a more defensive edge forward in Isaiah Papali'i as the Dragons have two of the more beastly edge forwards in Tyson Frizell and Tariq Sims.

A low key great stat from the first two games is Papali'i making 33 tackles with 1 missed tackle vs Knights, then 30 tackles and no missed tackles vs Raiders. This aligns with the idea of a more defensive approach vs Frizell and Sims, although Papali'i did predominantly play through the middle in those two games and defending in the middle could be viewed as easier than the edges; middle means you've got more help around you, while on the edges you have quicker blokes running to deal with and less help.

Two games in and the experiment of Chanel Harris-Tavita starting in the halves and Kodi Nikorima coming of the bench as part of the dummy half rotation with Wayde Egan, appears to be over. Nikorima is now named in the halves and given how terrible the Warriors looked in attack, I'm eager to see a different combination in action as long as coach Kearney can give one group of play-makers time to settle alongside each other.

The split between Harris-Tavita and Green was a bit weird with no two-game pattern established. Harris-Tavita 43 touches vs Green's 49 touches in game one, along with 13 kicks vs Green's 9 kicks. Game two saw Harris-Tavita with 39 touches vs Green's 49 and 4 kicks vs Green's 10 kicks. Somehow the game in which Harris-Tavita got sent to the sin-bin, he almost had as many touches as Green and had more kicks, then those numbers are flipped when Harris-Tavita played 80mins in game two.

I say all that because there was no pattern of play in operation, other than a left/right halves split with the left-sided Harris-Tavita playing on the left. When Nikorima has previously played in the halves at the Warriors, it's the same split and I'm intrigued about Nikorima's involvement as I like his speed (the Warriors don't have much) although Nikorima won't do much long kicking and opposition teams will isolate Green.

My key to Warriors success is dummy half running - if I had to offer just one.

The Warriors are 13th in dummy half runs.

This is a case of outside backs not using their footwork and power out of dummy half, instead taking their runs one pass off the ruck where three/four defenders are waiting. In the two games, Warriors outside backs combined for 7 dummy half runs and 14 NRL players have more than 7 dummy half runs as individuals.

Then, we have the actual dummy halves with new signing Egan putting up 3 dummy half runs in two games for 16m. Nikorima didn't have any in game one, then 3 dummy half runs for 21m in game two and now it's up to Egan and Karl Lawton (the first all-Aussie Warriors dummy half rotation in ages/if ever?) to offer spice out of dummy half.

The Egan/Lawton rotation is something I suggest to play close attention to, especially with scoping out outside back involvement. The Warriors won five of eight games when Lawton was playing last year, so generally speaking it is usually good when Lawton does play.

Both hearty and casual fans may be wondering about David Fusitu'a who has become a Warriors and Tonga staple on the wing, then got moved to centre for 2020 and is now quarantining it up. Fusitu'a averaged roughly 8m/run in those two games, a couple tackle breaks in each game and was alright, nothing amazing.

The centre position is an issue though. This will be the third centre combination used in three games (Fusitu'a/Hiku, Fusitu'a/Keighran, Hiku/Beale) and the first two games saw both centres combine for 11 missed tackles, which gets way more concerning when boiled through their total tackles made...

Game One Tackle Efficiency

Fusitu'a: 87.5%. Hiku: 73.9%.

Game Two Tackle Efficiency

Fusitu'a: 72.7%. Keighran: 66.7%.

Other than Maumalo apparently forgetting how to tackle vs Raiders (1 tackle, 5 missed tackles @ 16.7%) the centres put up the worst tackle efficiency percentages in either game. Far from ideal considering that most teams roll out their backline moves to target/isolate a those defending on the edges and now we have Gerard Beale and Hiku as the centres.

The good news is that the Dragons aren't so good either, losing both their first two games and while they actually managed to score points (42 vs Warriors' 6), the Dragons conceded more points than the Warriors (56 vs 40). Ranked 15th in possession, the Dragons enjoyed just 42 percent of the footy across their two games and not many NRL teams will win games with that much footy.

How the Warriors roll through the middle will be crucial to possible success vs Dragons. They are boosted by the return of Agnatius Paasi and while they have lost Leeson Ah Mau, there is an opportunity for Jamayne Taunoa-Brown, King Vuniyayawa and Katoa to provide energy, aggression and ruthless oomph. The likes of Lachlan Burr and Blair are about as stale as middle forwards get in terms of running the footy, which places greater emphasis on where the Warriors get the oomph from; teams load up on Maumalo and I've highlighted a lack of body shape/size variety in the Warriors forward pack previously.

That's why I'm intrigued by the less experienced forwards who have a great opportunity ahead of them, as well as size/mobility/footwork/power that makes them trickier to handle through the middle. Don't forget that Josh Curran and new signing Jack Murchie are on the extended bench, which doesn't feel like competition for Burr or Blair but does ensure some level of competition for spots is present and that should see the young forwards shine.

Now, this flows into an apparent deal for Roosters forward Poasa Fa'aumausili on a multi-week loan. Other than providing an example of how it's insane to think that the Warriors have first dibs on rugby league talent in Aotearoa when all NRL clubs invest plenty into scouting Aotearoa and thus the Roosters have Glenora Bears junior Fa'amausili, Marist Saints junior Sitili Tupouniua, Otahuhu Leopards junior Isaac Liu and a young outside back from Ellerslie Eagles/Sacred Heart Asu Kepaoa on their roster.

Yeah well, other than that, grabbing Fa'amausili for a few weeks is super duper meh.

Great news for Fa'amausili who is on the Roosters exteded bench this week and won't have much else to do unless there are injuries/suspension in the Roosters forward pack. The Roosters recruited Fa'amausili from Auckland and along with Tupouniua, coach Trent Robinson does a great job at easing blokes into steady NRL roles, so I doubt the Roosters will let Fa'amausili sign anything more than a loan deal - which would be ideal for the Warriors.

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Peace and love.