Rugby League: We're all raring to get stuck in

By JOE VAGANA

SYDNEY - We've had plenty of changes to the Kiwi squad and that's always disruptive, but we still have the team spirit to get us a win tomorrow night.

The depth in the New Zealand side is good, and although no side would want to miss out on players like Jarrod McCracken and Quentin Pongia. We certainly don't lose anything in size and power by bringing in Tony Puletua and David Kidwell. Both those guys have been here before so the changes aren't the big deal they might once have been.

Everyone in camp is here on form and that gives the team confidence. Consistency is what wins games at this level and all the 2000 Kiwis have proved they're up to it.

We're expecting war tomorrow night, with the usual damage done up front as both sides try to establish a platform for their backs. There's plenty of pressure on the pack, but we feel we can carry on from the tri-series, where we believe we had the better of them.

There's some payback there. We gave them the final by going to sleep in the last few minutes and dropping off a couple of critical tackles and it's something we've learned from and want to rectify.

Nothing beats beating Australia on Australian soil in front of their home crowd. We've shown we're up to their standard with one win in 1997, one in 1998, one last year. We'd like to get two in 2000, here and the World Cup.

With the black-and-white gear on and the spirit this squad have, anything is possible.

The Warriors in the squad haven't been letting the drama over the Townsville game get to us - it's over.

What counted for us was that we showed courage to win with 12 men for 70-odd minutes of the game. That gave us plenty of confidence in our ability coming into this test and confidence is just what we need.