Warriors coach Andrew Webster is yet to put a line through his side’s season, despite their Round 22 loss to the Eels slimming their chances of finals football.
The Warriors entered Round 22 needing a win to keep their dream of qualifying for the top eight at the end of the season alive, only to be met by an impressive Parramatta outfit, who won 30-20.
Asked post-game what impact the loss had on his side’s finals hopes, Webster said it “doesn’t make it better” but insisted he’s not “giving up.”
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With a bye in the final round of the season, the Warriors will need to win all four of their remaining games if they are to have any chance of qualifying for the finals, which Webster believes still remains on the cards.
“(I) still think if we win four games we can get there,” he said.
“We haven’t made it easy on ourselves but we won’t be giving up.”
Webster critcised his side’s error rate in the loss to the Eels, adding that their constant “frustrating” errors have limited their season.
“We haven’t seen our potential because of it this year,” he said.
“We’re going to have too much regret if we don’t fix it and we don’t get it right,” he said.
Against Parramatta, Webster’s side made 10 errors, two more than their opponent, though the coach insisted it wasn’t the volume of mistakes that cost them the two points.
“It’s not so much how many we have, it’s the type of ones we have. They lead to tries and we don’t defend them,” he said.
Webster described the loss as hurting “not so much because of the context of the season (but because) of how many dumb things we saw tonight.”
“Things that just weren’t good enough, weren’t up to NRL standard.”
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Moving forward, the former Penrith assistant coach put the onus on his side to rebound correctly and ensure they remain in the hunt for finals football.
“Can we move on? Can we get better? Can we get disciplined? Can we own our role? I’m really looking forward to seeing how everyone bounces back and challenges themselves not to hide or sook about this,” he said.
New Zealand’s loss came despite the much-anticipated returns of Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad and Shaun Johnson.
While the pair weren’t at their best, Webster said they had “decent returns” but admitted it was difficult for either to have any influence on the game when his side were “putting ourselves under pressure and missing all those tackles.”
The Warriors head to Brisbane to tackle the Dolphins, who also lost in Round 22, with a win ensuring their season remains alive for another week.
“We’ve got to make sure we finish and we have a crack at this,” Webster said.
“We’ve just got to win as many games as we can.”
