Willie Poching told The Big League Podcast that Metcalf and Boyd could be the ideal halves combination.<\/p>\n
\u201cTanah Boyd\u2019s been up there as one of their best, along with Jackson Ford. It\u2019d be very, very tough. It depends on the conversations that Andrew Webster\u2019s had with them. If some of those conversations are built around, \u2018hey, you give us your best performances, and you hold on to the jersey\u2019, then he\u2019s got to keep his word to that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Co-captain and prop Mitch Barnett\u2019s return<\/a> from his ACL injury came earlier than expected after Morgan Gannon suffered a head knock on debut against the Knights.<\/p>\n Barnett produced 11 runs for 121m \u2013 including 53 post-contact metres \u2013 and made some eye-catching tackles.<\/p>\n With Barnett, Ford and James Fisher-Harris<\/a> all available as starting front-rowers, interchange options Demitric Vaimauga or Tanner Stowers-Smith could find themselves pushed out of the first-grade squad.<\/p>\n Poching said Barnett went full bore into the action from his first carry.<\/p>\n \u201cMitch Barnett, there\u2019s no doubt in what he brings, and it could work as a good thing for Andrew Webster to have the ability to bring someone like Barnett off the bench for a couple of weeks, just to add that punch and ease him back into building up his minutes.<\/p>\n \u201cHe showed the comp that he\u2019s ready to go, and he\u2019s putting some pressure on Jackson Ford, who has been the standout player for the league, not just the standout front rower.<\/p>\n \u201cFord\u2019s topped the stats in so many metrics, the carries, tackles, he\u2019s playing 80 minutes and just full of quality. He\u2019s not just getting by for those 80 minutes, and scored himself a try as well. So he\u2019s put some pressure on the coach for that selection.\u201d<\/p>\n The Warriors have found themselves top of the ladder<\/a> at the end of the weekend for just the fifth time in history.<\/p>\n They had previously been top after rounds 23 and 26 in 2002 – the year they won the minor premiership – after round two in 2009 and round one in 2019.<\/p>\n Poching warned Warriors fans against getting over-excited.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s round three, there\u2019s so many twists and turns to come over the course of the season. The Warriors were flying last year and they lost their starting halfback and their starting front rower, their co-captain, and the demise of their season started, their slide started there. So I\u2019m not going to get too carried away right now with how they are.<\/p>\n \u201cBut what they\u2019re showing is they are capable of beating some good sides, and it\u2019ll be about consistency and staying fit throughout this year, but geez, they\u2019re making everyone confident.\u201d<\/p>\n Nathan Limm<\/a> has been a journalist with Newstalk ZB and the NZ Herald since 2020. He covered the Netball World Cup in Cape Town in 2023, hosts The Big League Podcast<\/a> and commentates rugby and netball for Gold Sport.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Willie Poching told The Big League Podcast that Metcalf and Boyd could be the ideal halves combination. \u201cTanah…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":559657,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[2533,64,63,1018,3181,22618,174590,2877,26582,761,762,158,204259,7820,3755,59908,97575,11510,85,320,276134,29525,276133,3198,229594,1050,3605],"class_list":["post-559656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-andrew","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-big","tag-coach","tag-couple","tag-headaches","tag-league","tag-major","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-original","tag-players","tag-podcast","tag-provided","tag-selection","tag-solutions","tag-sports","tag-the","tag-thrilled","tag-two","tag-unpacking","tag-warriors","tag-webster","tag-will","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=559656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/559657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}