Warriors get boost ahead of daunting NRL clash

By Michael Burgess

In the middle of a gloomy situation, the Warriors have had some positive news, with Shaun Johnson close to being back to full fitness.

The halfback has barely trained for more than a month – only taking back in some basic drills during each week’s captain’s run each week due to his Achilles problem – but will complete almost all of the sessions this week.

It’s a timely fillip, with the Warriors desperate for improvement, off the back of three consecutive defeats.

“We haven’t had Shaun train this early in the week for the last five weeks,” said coach Andrew Webster on Wednesday. “He might be pulled out of one or two drills but he will do 80 per cent of the drills, slowly building him up and hopefully next week he can do everything. He is hopefully coming out of this.”

While Webster was reluctant to link the lack of recent offensive cohesion with Johnson’s absence from the training field – “it is certainly not an excuse” he expected there would be benefits.

“It has had an impact on our attack and I can only see us getting better,” said Webster.

But there is a lot to fix, starting with the plague of errors and especially penalties that are killing momentum and inviting pressure from the opposition.

“[We are] not giving ourselves an opportunity through our discipline,” said Webster. “We are creating a lot of fatigue amongst ourselves. Trying to swing punches at the end of the game and our attack is clunky and slow and lethargic because we are putting ourselves under so much pressure.”

It’s a focus at training but is also about game smarts and reading the situation, instead of “over trying” in their enthusiasm to be aggressive.

While the team is under pressure, Webster wants them to find some calmness and clarity this week.

“You can be tense in these situations,” said Webster. “[So] be really clear minded rather than probably over heating mentally and trying to work too hard.”

But that will be hard, against a red hot Roosters team who have scored 100 points in their past two games and are also boosted by the likely returns of Brandon Smith, Victor Radley and Spencer Leniu. It’s a predicament – especially with the Panthers next up in Magic Round – but Webster isn’t looking too far ahead.

“It’s round nine - it’s not the last week or do or die or anything like that,” said Webster. “For us to win we have to improve. It is obvious we are not where we want to be. I don’t see it as we have to win this two game block to have any chance [this season].

“I’m real comfortable that if we make the right level of improvement and we play the way we want to, we will give ourselves the chance to win, and clearly if we do what we have done the last three weeks we are not going to get it.”

Kurt Capewell will be sidelined for up to a month with a calf strain but Dylan Walker is tracking well for Sunday after a “bad cork” above the knee in Sunday’s 14-8 loss in Newcastle.

The team will be based on the Central Coast for most of this week, before travelling to Sydney on the eve of Sunday’s match. The weather has been terrible – with “sideways rain” according to hooker Wayde Egan – but they have appreciated being in camp together.

“They are really motivated, working hard,” said Webster. “Sometimes you are closer than you think but I keep saying to the boys we will have to make our own luck and not just assume or expect it to happen. [But] we back ourselves, have a lot of confidence in ourselves.”

This article was first published on nzherald.co.nz and is republished here with permission