New Zealand Warriors coach Matthew Elliott praised his defence despite their last-gasp defeat to the Canberra Raiders at Canberra Stadium on Saturday evening.
The Warriors withstood a green tidal wave that crashed ineffectively against the stoic Kiwi defensive wall before the home team snatched victory with a try at the death.
But the Warriors tactician had a feeling that his team may eventually concede due to the wealth of possession that the Raiders had in the second stanza with the home team dominating territory and hogging the ball for large swathes of the second 40.
"I think anyone that gets that amount of possession given to them is going to come back," Elliott said.
"They [the Warriors defence] stuck in. I thought our defensive effort was pretty special but I thought the play count in the second half was 95 to 40 something so you are not going to win under those circumstances.
"The second half performance was disappointing with the ball even though our defence was fantastic. When a team has that amount of quality, and that amount of ball, and basically had to break us down with kicks I thought was pretty impressive from us back there."
The introduction of the experienced Campese certainly added another game-breaker to the Raiders ranks and, in ultimately, it was Campeses moment of magic that decided the outcome of the contest which, up until Lees second score, had seemed likely to go the Warriors way.
"I thought Campo was outstanding," Elliott admitted.
"His poise ended up being the difference because I felt pretty confident about our defence and they didnt look like penetrating. They scored one try close to the line when they had four or five sets in a row so our defence was pretty good. At the end of the day it was nice kicking from Campo and Josh [McCrone} that made the difference."
The Warriors coach found some positives about the Warriors play, heading into the international break, before they face a trip to Melbourne to battle the Storm in Round 7, but was downbeat about the errors made knowing that better is required if they are to rediscover their free-flowing football of last season.
"The first 50 minutes I was happy with," Elliott said.
"We were pretty constructive with the ball, unfortunately the errors that we made were individual skill and two really poor decisions on shift plays to try and promote the ball and, as I say, when youre down by a few it doesnt matter how courageous you are if you make errors."
http://www.sportal.co.nz/league-news-display/elliott-bemoans-warriors-errors-230431
OK. Now to see what he is going to do about it. Seemed stupid to me to leave Godinet out of the 17. He, more than anyone, adds a spark to the team.
