New Zealand Warriors

Friday, June 12, 2009

Another win another week

Nice win for the boys. Although winning ugly at home is not that nice really. A win is a win and I cannot complain but you need to be able to beat top sides with quality which is evidently not what the Warriors have at present.

Still I guess I should not be too bitchy when the season is still alive and Locke is shaping as a prospect. He, Hohaia, MCK and Mannering are the bedrock of this side and they need to hang on until Tate returns. Price is a god but will leave us all soon.

Monday, June 08, 2009

Countdown to Oblivion

Well first up terrible lost to the Sharks leaves the Warriors playoff hopes hanging by a thread. Second if you have not yet watched the Pepe Silvia video below, do so now before the really depressing reality of the Warriors season sets in. Third and on an upbeat note I am loving the prospect of the All Whites having to play North Korea for a shot at world cup qualification. Frankly if the All Whites go to the 2010 football World Cup this blog (in content at least) may temporarily become an All Whites World Cup supporters blog.

Now back to the ugly reality of the Warriors season. At the halfway stage - the Warriors have played twelve games and had one bye. They have won four games (8 pts), had one draw (1 pt) and had one bye (2 pts) for a total of 11 pts. To make the top eight they need a minimum of 28 pts. So they are 17 big points short of the promised land at this stage. There are 13 rounds remaining in the season. The Warriors have one further bye (round 15) so that takes the points required down to 15. But they have only 12 games in which to get those points. So its basically 8 wins required from 12 games. We have all seen the Warriors do the seemingly impossible in the past - but this quite frankly looks bad.

Warriors form line for rounds 1-13 is:
WWLLWWDLBLLWL

Sunday, May 31, 2009

Warriors beat Tigers

Great result for the Warriors - a 14-0 shut-out vs the Tigers.

Rookie Kevin Locke giving Warriors fans reason to hope once again.

In other sports news the Cheifs got spanked, Lebron got knocked out of the playoffs and Chelsea won the FA cup. So not much good news there.

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Warriors v Tigers

Well its about the time of year when the midseason NRL malaise sets in. It really is a long season - maybe there are too many games. Or maybe its just the fact that its always about this time of year when the Warriors seem locked in a kind of mid table purgatory - trying to squeek a win here or there to maintain the mathematical possibility of a playoff spot. One win in their last eight games is not good enough - and over reliance on the prospect of a miracle late season winning streak does not necessarily seem the best strategy. With that said - as I am noted in the past - maybe the first half of the season doesn't matter and its all just warm up for the run in to the playoffs. I just don't know and frankly I bore myself complaining about this team as its just the same indifferent mideseason Warriors form that we are all so accustomed to. Maybe we have to give it up for this year and focus on next year (when by the way this blog is going to go stratospheric). But what this team needs right now - is some wins.

So where are we - it could be a time warp reading some of the material out there on the Warriors weaknesses. Big men running at Stacey Jones to exploit defensive weakness - is this 2003? The bench is the place for Jones these days and this is hopefully what Cleary has learnt to date.

Last couple of games have been thrashings. Somehow after appearing to have great depth in the halves - the Warriors have spiralled back to complete reliance on Jones. The release of Fien perplexes me. Clearys steady hand may be starting to waiver.

Anyway Warriors (11th) play Tigers (10th) at home on Sunday. A win is desperately needed - as is some solution to the conundrum in the halves. Cleary is rejigging things a bit with the call up of two rookies - half/hooker Aaron Heremaia and under-20s star fullback Kevin Locke. Maybe its all just preperation for the future. Lets hope it works.

Pub talk

Hello everyone - hope you liked that Pepe Silvia clip - its from a show call "Its always sunny in Philadelphia".

I was told last night by a somewhat drunken individual that they only get their Warriors news from this blog and that due to my slackness in updating - they had no idea how the Warriors season was getting on. I kind of like the narrowness of this worldview - the idea that the world wide followers of this blog - in their thousands for sure - wakes every day and logs on to this site - only to have their hopes of a dose of Warriors news with no possible alternative dashed by my lack of an update. If you want to use this blog to the exclusion of all other news sources, be my guest, I just hope I don't dissappoint you.

Anyway lots going on outside of Warriors world at the moment - busy work - and packing up my life here in London for my imminent return to NZ. Will fly out from UK for good on 5 July, back in NZ by the start of December 2009.

But for now its saturday, twenty degrees and sunny and I am not at work right now - so things are looking pretty good.

A big day in Sport today, FA Cup final, Super 14 final and Game 6 of the Cavs v Magic NBA playoff series. After dominating the entire season Lebron finds himself one game away from elimination (Orlando lead 3-2 in the best of seven series), how did the Cavs blow it so badly? Kobe by the way has just got himself and his Lakers into another NBA finals series. So that mouth watering Lebron/Kobe matchup is still a mathematical possibility - but would require a series of uninterupted Lebron miracles for it to happen.

I will try and catch some of the Cheifs game - they seem a bit like the Warriors of the super 14 to me - always alot of promise but until now - not much in the way results. Lets hope they can pull off a win.

FA Cup - I have to admit I really don't care that much about the result other than to say if Chelsea lose it would be preferable as Moyes really does deserve a trophy.

And finally I would just like to say - North Korea - wtf are you thinking?

As for the Warriors -now I have got everything else out - my next post will bring us up to date!