NRL: Signs good after draw at Albany

Michael Luck. Photo / Getty Images

If the season started three weeks ago, the Warriors would be near the head of the table.

Two wins and a draw in their three pre-season games is a good return. It will breathe confidence into a side that badly under-achieved last season in finishing 14th.

Sadly, not too much can be read into it. Pre-season games are exactly that. The real season starts in a fortnight when the Warriors travel to the Gold Coast.

There were enough good signs yesterday, though, to give fans hope the Warriors can turn it around. They looked sharp, fit and defended well, especially in the second half when they kept Manly scoreless despite coming under constant pressure, and they have come through pre-season largely unscathed.

The biggest concern centred around winger Kevin Locke who hobbled from the field just before halftime after taking a knee to his back. He declared himself a doubtful starter in a fortnight but more will be known today when the injury is assessed.

Manly will closely monitor Joe Galuvao, who was knocked out and stretchered from the field after clashing heads with Russell Packer.

The Warriors have been looking for an outside back since last season and are still nibbling around Parramatta's Krisnan Inu. The club rates Bill Tupou and are considering upgrading the 19-year-old to a first-team contract.

Coach Ivan Cleary has much to ponder ahead of that first game and he gave his players plenty of time yesterday to impress. The biggest decisions appear to be around fullback, centre and five-eighth.

Lance Hohaia and Wade McKinnon played a half each at the back. Brent Tate, Jerome Ropati and Joel Moon are battling it out for three centre positions and Brett Maloney, Shaun Johnson and Moon are vying for the No 6 jersey.

Maloney looks to have the inside running to partner Brett Seymour in the halves, especially given his greater experience than Johnson, but Cleary has indicated he won't be shy about plumping for the exciting youngster at some stage in the season.

Encouragingly, Tate played 40 minutes last night. He didn't get many chances but he didn't shirk from contact and ran down one break in his first game in nearly 12 months. The 27-year-old is a class player and his absence last season was a big reason the Warriors were so poor.

"It's just really good for him to be able to tick that one off," Cleary said. "It alleviates a lot of doubt when you haven't played for so long. He will be feeling pretty good.

"I've got a few selection issues [to sort out]. There are definitely some calls I'm not sure about. That's hard, but it's good."

The home side played with more freedom than they did for most of 2009. It's difficult to read much from pre-season form but they were willing yesterday to offload the ball from any area on the park and Cleary has said they want to play a more attacking style.

They didn't, though, create many try-scoring opportunities. Simple handling errors didn't help their cause and neither did the constant coming and going of players in pre-season games.

Their first try came from a tried and true source, with Manu Vatuvei claiming a Seymour bomb and somehow wriggling around to dot the ball down when he seemed destined for the touchline. The second saw Moon slip through some dreadful defence to dot down under the posts.

The third, and the one that levelled the scores with just three minutes to play, was the best. It went through several sets of hands before Maloney slipped his marker and popped a pass for new boy Jeremy Latimore to score.

"It's not just about confidence," Cleary said of pre-season form.

"More than that it was the way we played as a team. I think everyone is on the same page and working hard for each other so I'm always happy to see that. It is a different ball game once the season starts but so far I'm pretty happy."

Warriors: 16 (M. Vatuvei, J. Moon, J. Latimore tries, B. Seymour gl, S. Johnson gl)
Manly: 16 (M. Robertson 2, G. Rose tries, J. Lyon 2 gls). HT: 10-16.