New Zealand Warriors Return To Mt Smart vs Raiders After Aussie Tour Sweep
The New Zealand Warriors tour of Australia finished with a win over Dolphins and this gives Warriors folks a taste of something they can't have experienced too often before as they had three consecutive wins in Australia. Before wins vs Cowboys, Dragons and Dolphins there were wins in Aotearoa vs Broncos and Knights, making it five wins in a row.
Things get crazier as the NSW Cup Warriors have won five consecutive games and are 5-0 in Australia this season. Somehow it's even more aligned because the last three wins for the NSW Cup Warriors have all been in Australia, which means both the NRL and NSW Cup teams have won three consecutive games in Australia.
The top-two tiers of NZW combine for a 17-3 record this year. The NRL and NSW Cup teams have been top-four teams in five of their six seasons during the two Andys era. NSW Cup have been a top-four team in all three seasons and the NRL team dipped out of the top-four last season before bouncing back this year.
NRL: 2nd | 8-2
NSW Cup: 1st | 9-1
Jersey Flegg Cup: 12th | 2-6-2
NZW haven't played near their best in their last five wins and this makes their winning mahi even more impressive. In all five games they have been the better team but gave their opposition lots of chances to drag themselves back into the contest and old NZW teams probably would have lost those games. Four of the five games were won by four points or less and the only team who didn't get that close to NZW in this winning streak were Knights, which reflects their current predicament, but even then there were plenty of opportunities for Knights to make it a closer game.
As noted after each of these wins, there are lots of holes one can poke in the NZW performances. They won all five games though and did so without James Fisher-Harris or Roger Tuivasa-Sheck for most of this period, while others like Ali Leiataua, Jackson Ford, Bunty Afoa and Rocco Berry have all missed games over the last five weeks as well.
While Australians wait for trendy teams to stop losing games or whip themselves into the frenzy of goofy dramas, NZW have emerged as one of the best organisations this season. Given the NSW Cup dominance over the last three years and back to back Under 17 Harold Matthews Cup championships, as well as an excellent 2023 NRL season, one may suggest that NZW have reinforced their stats as one of the best organisations in recent weeks.
The seasonal cycles swing back around for the NRL team to fix up their round one loss vs Raiders. It will be tricky to win this game against a good Raiders team without giving their best performance of the season a nudge, improving on the wins that set this season in motion against Sea Eagles, Roosters and Tigers.
Fisher-Harris and Mitchell Barnett are both out but Bunty Afoa and Jackson 'Go' Ford are back in the mix to take their spots. The middle forward trio of Fisher-Harris, Barnett and Erin Clark is awesome so it will be interesting to see if NZW can hold down the middle of the field without two of the leaders. This presents an opportunity for the best NZW player this season in Clark to flex as the key figure of the middle.
Clark is second for NZW run metres and first for post contact metres. He's also got the most offloads for NZW and the distribution flows through him. Clark either fakes the pass to boost forward and make swift metres or he passes, usually to Luke Metcalf or Chanel Harris-Tavita who benefit from the space that Clark's run threat provides.
The back three should help NZW start their sets on a roll. While Tuivasa-Sheck was a bit rusty vs Dolphins, he was straight back into his running mahi and this was balanced by Dallin Watene-Zelezniak being below his usual oomph. Nicoll-Klokstad and Tuivasa-Sheck usually hover around 18-20 runs for 10m/run, so all Watene-Zelezniak needs to do is get up around 13-15 runs and hitting that 10m/run mark.
Here's the back three mahi vs Dolphins
Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad: 19 runs - 179m @ 9.4m/run, 2 tackle breaks, 6 tackles @ 75%
Roger Tuivasa-Sheck: 22 runs - 209m @ 9.5m/run, 1 offload, 4 tackles @ 100%
Dallin Watene-Zelezniak: 10 runs - 88m @ 8.8m/run, 1 tackle break, 14 tackles @ 87.5%
Two other zones of interest...
Halves Tries & Try Assists This Season
Luke Metcalf: 7 tries | 4 try assists
Chanel Harris-Tavita: 3 tries | 8 try assists
This balance continues with Metcalf averaging more run metres per game (76m vs 55m) while Harris-Tavita is second behind Nicoll-Klokstad for support runs. As noted all season they are sharing the kicking mahi nicely as they both have 2,300+ kick metres and are both in the top-15 for kick metres. The only team that has two players in the top-15 for kick metres is Rabbitohs with Jamie Humphreys and Latrell Mitchell.
Take that further for the Raiders match up where Jamal Fogarty is second for kick metres and there is no other Raiders player in the top-50. Raiders offer too much funky footy to load up pressure on Fogarty and leave holes elsewhere, but this at least highlights how balanced the NZW halves combo has been this season.
There will be two different dummy half running styles on show in this game. Wayde Egan is still first for dummy half runs in the NRL and along with Harry Grant they are the only players averaging over six dummy half runs per game. Raiders average more dummy half runs per game as a team though and have seven players in the top-50 for dummy half runs, while NZW only have two with Adam Pompey joining Egan.
Raiders will be busy around the ruck with their hookers and fast backs likely to challenge the middle defence of NZW. This could be where the absences of Fisher-Harris and Barnett may be a problem because they help control the ruck with their grappling to slow the play the ball speed down, as well as efforts to make tackles around the ruck.
Egan had 4 DHR - 44m @ 11m/run against Dolphins and is hovering around that 10m/run mark when scooting from dummy half. This is extra impressive because Egan isn't fast or powerful and he always has the crafty passing threat to challenge defenders. Here are Egan's dummy half running stats from four games prior to the win vs Dolphins...
vs Broncos: 3 DHR - 31m @ 10.3m/run
vs Knights: 8 DHR - 93m @ 11.6m/run
vs Cowboys: 3 DHR - 24m @ 8m/run
vs Dragons: 7 DHR - 79m @ 11.2m/run
The NSW Cup and Jersey Flegg Cup teams are both playing against Bulldogs. The full U21s team hasn't been named yet and there are always NZW junior notes in our newsletter that drops every Monday and Thursday evening so sign up for that.
Taine Tuaupiki, Ali Leiataua and Edward Kosi are all named in NSW Cup. Tom Ale is named at prop after featuring at edge forward in a few games this season. Eddie Ieremia-Toeava has been in and out of NSW Cup due to his NRL duties even though he is yet to debut, now he's named at edge forward.
Samuel Healey is named at hooker and with Tuaupiki at fullback, Geronimo Doyle is on the bench as a utility. This bumps Makaia Tafua out of the team and if he is available he will probably be in the U21 team. U21s named in NSW Cup: Luke Hanson, Kayliss Fatialofa, Eddie Ieremia-Toeava, Jason Salalilo and Harry Durbin.
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Peace and love.