Any remote hope of finals football was snuffed out when the One New Zealand Warriors fell just short of success losing 26-32 in their round eight SG Ball Cup (under-19) clash against Western Suburbs at Bruce Pulman Park in Takanini on Sunday.
Victory was imperative if the Warriors were to remain in mathematical contention for the top eight.
Coming off a shattering 4-44 loss to Parramatta, the Warriors faced a Magpies side sitting in a similar area of the table with the same record of two wins and five losses.
If their confidence had suffered it didn’t show as they made a lightning start to the contest scoring in the opening minute and again six minutes later.
First they shifted left with halves Hinckley Ioka and Wiremu Makea combining to give centre Parekaahu Keepa a passage to the line.
Match: Warriors v Magpies
Round 8 -
home Team
Warriors
away Team
Magpies
Venue: Bruce Pulman Park, Takanini
And left was the option again on a last tackle play in the seventh minute, fullback Mark Sikuvea with a long pass to Keepa who gave his winger Ezekiel Davidson-Faaiuaso just enough room to squeeze in at the corner.
Having made the right moves they immediately handed the momentum over to the visitors with an error close to their line. The Magpies responded with an eighth minute try and then added two more tries later in the half to take a 14-10 lead into the break.
The Magpies scored their fourth straight try in the opening minutes of the second half to extend to 20-10 after 42 minutes but Warriors front rower Micah Sula had his side back in it with powerhouse try four minutes later. Receiving the ball 20 metres out he carried any number of defenders with him on an unstoppable charge to get the ball down.
Just four points behind at 16-20 the Warriors needed to be the next to score but instead Western Suburbs reacted with two tries in three minutes for a telling 32-16 lead with 13 minutes to play.
With eight minutes left, the impressive Sula steamrolled his way over again, this time from 10 metres out with five defenders unable to stop him.
Three minutes later the Warriors were in again running the ball on the last tackle, Hinckley with an incisive run feeding to hooker Rene Frame inside him.
With Connor Bowden’s conversion the score was 26-32 with four minutes to play but the Magpies held on.
The result leaves the Warriors 12th on the ladder before their last match of the season against the Illawarra Steelers in Wollongong next Saturday.
