KEY POINTS:
The New Zealand Warriors will look to shut down Parramatta's creativity when the two sides open their National Rugby League campaigns in Auckland tomorrow night.
"All I can see is danger all across the field," coach Ivan Cleary said of the opposition.
The Eels will field a near full strength line-up at Mt Smart Stadium, with the key absentees being second rower Nathan Hindmarsh and winger Eric Grothe, both out through injury.
But Cleary said the visitors had plenty of depth to their squad.
"Their Premier League side won the 'comp' last year," he said.
"They've got a lot of good players. They will send 17 guys out who will be hard to beat."
Cleary didn't expect to face a vastly different Parramatta under new coach Michael Hagan, the former Newcastle mentor who swapped clubs with Brian Smith in the summer.
There might be one or two new things, but any major changes to game plan took time.
"I think we've got a fair handle on how they are going to play," he said.
"But one thing they do have is a lot of creativity. When you have those types of players, it's very hard to know exactly what they are going to come up with."
The Warriors have had limited success against Parramatta in recent times, with the Eels winning the last five encounters between the clubs.
Cleary has given starts to three of his new Australian signings -- fullback Wade McKinnon, winger Michael Crockett and five-eighth Michael Witt.
Former Wests Tiger Crockett edges out Todd Byrne for the berth vacated by Patrick Ah Van, who is coming back from off-season surgery.
Witt, who arrived from Manly after an earlier stint at Parramatta, has first crack at the No 6 jersey with Jerome Ropati out with a back injury.
Cleary said he hadn't yet decided on his first-choice five-eighth, a role Ropati had begun to cement last season.
At the same time, he wouldn't complain if Witt played well enough that he couldn't be left out.
Cleary also saw centre Simon Mannering's move to the second row and utility Lance Hohaia's selection at centre, where he filled in late last season, as temporary measures.
They were made because of Wairangi Koopu's unavailability through a shoulder complaint and fellow backrowers Micheal Luck and Louis Anderson having had limited game time in the trials.
The preference for George Gatis over Nathan Fien as starting hooker was based on fitness.
While Gatis was "probably the fittest he's ever been", Fien had had to battle through a couple of injuries early in the off-season.
"But they will probably spend a similar amount of time on the field, so it's six of one and half a dozen of the other, really."
Meanwhile, the workaholic Hindmarsh, who is out with arthritis until round three, is confident the painful joint ailment won't slow him down over the remainder of his career.
He accepted that arthritis was one of the hazards of playing contact sport and that other parts of his body could be affected down the track, but believed he had plenty of seasons left in him.
Hindmarsh, 27, recently re-signed with the Eels until the end of 2010 and club skipper and New Zealand prop Nathan Cayless did the same this week.
Cayless, 28, added an extra three years to his contract, which was due to have ended at the conclusion of this season.
- NZPA
