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. Many important themes and ideas have already been covered in these breakdowns below...

New Zealand Warriors Return To The Temple Of Mt Smart vs Manly Sea Eagles

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New Zealand Warriors Winning Footy Observations Early In The 2025 NRL Season

New Zealand Warriors Get The Claws Out vs Wests Tigers

Tap in with how NZW are ranked in a bunch of stats ahead of round five to get a general gauge of how the season is tracking...

NZ Warriors Stat Profile (per game)

Set Completion: 1st - 84.6%
Supports: 10th
Line Engaged: 13th
Decoys: 2nd
Linebreaks: 15th
Post Contact Metres: 1st
Tackle Breaks: 7th
Run Metres: 1st
Kick Return Metres: 10th
Dummy Half Runs: 1st
Offloads: 14th
Missed Tackles: 8th
Kick Metres: 9th
Penalties Conceded: 17th

Wayde Egan getting busy

NZW are the most active team scooting out of dummy half and most of that comes from Wayde Egan, who is the busiest dummy half runner in the NRL. Egan has played 80 minutes in all four games this season which showcases his brewing mana as well as boosting NZW attack given he has been on the field for every play this season.

Egan averaged over 50m/game in one season prior to 2025. That was 2023 when he averaged 51m/game and he has blown away all of his last seven NRL seasons with 92m/game this year. Egan averages eight dummy half runs per game and the next best is Harry Grant on five dummy half runs per game.

A magical running mark is 10m/run and Egan covered that in each of the first three games. Egan dipped below that mark vs Tigers but was just as good, if not better than Apisai Koroisau in wet conditions. Here's the info...

vs Raiders: 6 DHR - 62m @ 10.3m/run | 51 tackles @ 92.7%
vs Sea Eagles: 9 DHR - 91m @ 10.1m/run | 41 tackles @ 95.3%
vs Roosters: 11 DHR - 110m @ 10m/run | 48 tackles @ 90.5%
vs Tigers: 6 DHR - 46m @ 7.6m/run | 45 tackles @ 86.5%

NZW vs Tigers

Wayde Egan: 80mins, 7 runs - 54m @ 7.7m/run, 1 linebreak assist, 1 tackle break, 2 offloads
Apisai Koroisau: 62mins, 5 runs - 37m @ 7.4m/run (3 DHR -21m @ 7m/run), 1 offload, 39 tackles @ 81.2%

Koroisau is an excellent dummy half and yet he hasn't played more than 65mins in his three games this season, nor has he had more than 50 running metres. There is obviously nuance required in this comparison but because Koroisau is a benchmark of dummy half mahi, along with Storm hooker Grant, all of this shows how influential Egan has been to start the season. With my NZW goggles on, there is a strong case to be made that Egan has been the best dummy half in the NRL so far.

New recruits: James Fisher-Harris and Erin Clark

NZW won three consecutive games without Tohu Harris and Addin Fonua-Blake. plus they cruised through the departure of Dylan Walker for the win vs Tigers. First of all ponder how NZW lead the NRL for post contact metres per game ahead of round five without Fonua-Blake. Many assumed that losing Fonua-Blake would be a massive blow to NZW and yet they are holding steady, perhaps playing better with a slightly different style of footy.

Sidenote down a different estuary: Jackson Ford has been crucial in absorbing the loss of Fonua-Blake ... huh?

That wasn't the case in round tahi when Ford started but since returning to the bench, Ford has been incredible. Ford leads NZW for post contact metres and he has been a destructive Taniwha in the last three games, offering just as much impact, if not more, than Dylan Walker against Tigers.

vs Sea Eagles: 32mins, 11 runs - 110m @ 10m/run, 1 tackle break, 26 tackles @ 100%
vs Roosters: 62mins, 15 runs - 151m @ 10m/run, 2 tackle breaks, 43 tackles @ 87.7%
vs Tigers: 38mins, 14 runs - 147m @ 10.5m/run, 8 tackle breaks, 23 tackles @ 76.6%

Ford is averaging more metres in less minutes compared to last season...

2024: 69.2 minutes | 102.8m
2025: 45.8 minutes | 127.8m

Back to the ruthless mahi of Fisher-Harris and Clark who have added plenty to the middle forward rotation this season, although in different ways.

Fisher-Harris is a strong runner of the footy and every run he takes dents the defensive wall. His sneaky speed and mobility combined with how he often leads with his shoulder ensures that the defence must get sick of tackling him, especially after doing it 10-15 times. Other middle forwards catch headlines for their running ability but this is a perfect run and Fisher-Harris has plenty of them every game...

His running mahi is strong but the most notable changes from his 2024 NRL championship campaign with Panthers is a slight increase in minutes per game and a hefty increase in tackles per game.

(minutes | tackles | metres)

James Fisher-Harris

2024: 46.6 | 26.8 | 127.2
2025: 50.8 | 37.5 | 123.3

Four more minutes should not lead to 10 more tackles per game but for Fisher-Harris there is a clear focus on controlling the middle of the field through physicality and technique, over and over again. Fisher-Harris has the stamina to not only show up for tackles throughout a game, but he is fantastic wrestler who can fold a runner up and squeeze them to slow down the ruck.

Fisher-Harris and Clark have added more aggression to the middle alongside Mitchell Barnett. Clark loves to whack in tackles and his speed helps him cover gaps in the defensive line, but the biggest development from his 2024 season with Titans is a massive increase in running metres.

Erin Clark

2024: 38.8 | 22.2 | 99.3
2025: 46 | 26 | 151.8

Clark is averaging almost 10mins more this season which is reflected in a few more tackles. That should not be responsible for 50 more running metres though and yet Clark, like Egan, has blown away all of his previous seasons in running the footy. This is Clark's first season averaging over 100m/game and with his speed around the ruck, combined with Egan's increased involvement, there is glimpse into the change from lots of passing in 2023 and 2024 to a more direct style of footy this season.

The grizzly mahi of Fisher-Harris and Clark has eased the load on Barnett as well. Barnett averaged 65.4 minutes per game last season and is now averaging 52.3mins/game. That's almost 10 minutes less and yet Barnett is churning out a similar number of tackles per game, going from 31.7 tackles/game last season to 32.5 this season.

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Versatility

Barnett's similar number of tackles in 10 fewer minutes as well as Fisher-Harris doing more tackling this season form an indicator of how NZW love tackling. Barnett also played lots of edge forward last season where he did less tackling and this flows into how NZW have a bunch of versatile players who can cover different positions without fuss mid-game.

When Walker departed NZW there was lots of noise about his utility value and how many different positions he can play. Walker wasn't the bloke who helped NZW deal with Roger Tuivasa-Sheck's injury vs Roosters though and without Walker, NZW dealt with Edward Kosi's HIA against Tigers fairly well.

NZW didn't concede a point after Tuivasa-Sheck left the field against Roosters and instead scored two tries to win the game.

NZW conceded two tries in the period when Kosi was off the field against Tigers but one try was off a grubber on the right edge and the other was through the middle.

NZW haven't conceded a try down their left edge in these phases despite losing their left winger in both wins. Because it was the left winger in both cases, the rotation was clear with Adam Pompey moving from centre to wing and Kurt Capewell moving from edge forward to centre. Against Roosters it was Barnett who moved from the middle to the left edge and against Tigers it was Leka Halasima who played left edge forward when Kosi departed.

Pompey and Capewell aren't trendy NZW players but they do their jobs well when playing their ideal position, then they cover other positions with class. Along with Barnett playing middle and edge, Taine Tuaupiki is the next best fullback behind Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad and Tuaupiki has played all four games on the wing this season.

Youngsters

Keep the versatility thread in motion with the youngsters because this is a key attribute for the emerging talent at NZW. Halasima made his NRL debut against Bulldogs last season and his introduction was as a middle forward, then he moved to right edge, followed by a stint at right centre due to a savage cluster of injuries.

Halasima played left edge vs Tigers when Kosi was off the field and then moved to the right edge to give Marata Niukore a rest. In both games, Halasima made a crazy break down the right side of the field even though his first taste of action in those games was in the middle or left edge. So far in his NRL career Halasima has played middle, left edge, right edge and right centre.

Eddie Ieremia-Toeava will probably debut at some stage this season and he has been playing middle forward, edge forward and centre in NSW Cup. Kayliss Fatialofa is an impressive young talent on the rise who flows between edge forward and centre with ease. Sio Kali is a freaky outside back talent who is best deployed at centre, but he's covered fullback and wing in the NZW system.

Samuel Healey is a hooker who could play alongside Egan because of his size and attacking skillset. NZW also have a young dummy half in Makaia Tafua who is developing as a small forward thanks to his brutal defence and physicality.

Halasima has the highlights that make it easy to celebrate him. Before Halasima's try vs Tigers, NZW defeated Roosters with Ali Leiataua scoring two tries and along with Vaimauga building into a steady role, the consistency of Leiataua and Vaimauga is just as important as Halasima's hype.

Leiataua has played 80 minutes in all four games this season along with Pompey, they are the best centres right now. After one game in 2023, Leiataua played six games last season and he is on track to pass those two seasons combined in the next few weeks. He has already scored the same number of tries this season as he did last season (three) and there is improvement in his tackling efficiency (88.6% vs 91.8%).

Vaimauga has also played the same number of games this season (four) as he did last season and he's on track to pass his seven games from 2023/24 combined in the coming weeks. Aside from trying to punch the ball out instead of making a tackle vs Tigers, that was his best game of the season and he was a sneaky benefactor of Walker's departure.

After three games playing less than 20mins off the bench, Vaimauga played 29mins vs Tigers. He didn't have any tackle breaks in the first three games of the season and then had three vs Tigers. Vaimauga's role is all about efficiency and while his increased minutes led to more runs/more metres against Tigers, that was his most effiecient metre-eating performance of the season...

vs Raiders: 6 runs - 37m @ 6.1m/run
vs Sea Eagles: 4 runs - 36m @ 9m/run
vs Roosters: 6 runs - 67m @ 11.1m/run
vs Tigers: 7 runs - 90m @ 12.8m/run

NSW Cup

For the third season in a row during the two Andys era, NZW are one of the best teams in NSW Cup. They have had a 4-0 start to this season and this is extra impressive considering that the majority of the NSW Cup group is 25-years-old or younger, plus there have been various departures of solid reserve graders like Ben Farr, Paul Roache, Ronald Volkman etc over the last three seasons.

2023: 3rd | 14-9-1 | +160 points difference
2024: 4th | 14-9-1 | +84 points difference
2025: 1st | 4-0 | +61 points difference

NZW have losing U21 and U19 teams, which is a trend across multiple seasons like the winning NSW Cup team. Most of the best young talent isn't playing in those age-grades though and they are instead helping the reserve grade team win. If the NSW Cup were losing along with the U21 and U19 teams, then this would be a bigger problem that reflected poorly on the NZW system.

That's not the case though. One snapshot is how the NSW Cup team that defeated Western Suburbs (Tigers) last weekend had 13 of the 17 players being youngsters, most of whom were younger than 23-years-old. NZW have a genuine development pipeline that is designed to produce players for the next level up and the best youngsters are helping the NSW Cup team win.

It would be silly of me to chill on the U21 and U19 results, then celebrate the U17 tier. There are so many variables at work in these junior grades that diminish the importance of results and NZW are clearly using each tier as a development exercise. For anyone who cares though...

NZW in Under 17 Harold Matthews Cup

2024: 6th | 5-3 | champions
2025: 1st | 6-1

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Peace and love.