Rugby League: Another day, another chance

By JOE VAGANA

The Roosters will start this weekend without their first-choice props in Quentin Pongia and Scott Logan, but no way will we be taking them lightly as a result.

We made that mistake against Canberra. The Raiders' number two young guys stepped up to us and really took it to us, trying to prove their worth to the team.

It's certainly harder this season, with the cut in the number of teams. All sides have beefed up their talent and depth, and the measure of that is the number of quality players still without jobs.

But that's no excuse for the way we performed last week against the Dragons. Believe me, we certainly felt it when the crowd started walking out with 15 minutes to go.

Defeat was even harder to swallow since we had a good start, a good lead that we should have gone on with. Instead we shut up shop, thinking something would go wrong, and it did.

Our main problem is a lack of confidence within the squad, but it's very hard to finger why that is. Personally, I know I have to go out and enjoy myself more, not worry too much about making mistakes.

We want to be the Warriors that finished the season last year, not the ones we are now.

There is a lack of confidence to make those little plays that win games. We feel we're not far away. We've had a good look at ourselves over the past month, and hopefully it will come together this weekend.

Stacey will play a big part, we know. We can't put too much pressure on him, expect him to do everything for us, but he lifts the whole team so much just by being there.

He's number one or two halfback in the world, depending whether you rate him or Andrew Johns top, and having that sort of quality player around instils confidence.

The Roosters have danger men all over the park: Fittler and Lam are their obvious ones, but we'll be watching for Bryan Fletcher coming through. He can offload with five players smothering him.

We've trained well this week. We searched for what was wrong, checked our fitness and other basics and found no obvious answers.

We know we're as fit, fast, strong and skilful as any team. We also know we have to prepare better mentally, be confident individually and in one another's ability.

We're on edge, sure, but the good thing is it's another opportunity this weekend, and we intend to put our all into taking it.