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\n Isaiya Katoa in action against the Broncos.
\n \u00a9Scott Davis \/ NRL Images
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History made, finals secured and a rare derby win against the Broncos, but Isaiya Katoa and the Dolphins weren\u2019t celebrating too hard on Saturday night \u2013 instead keeping focused on their next results.<\/p>\n
The Dolphins fought back against a spirited Brisbane side who had them trailing 24-0 after only 23 minutes \u2013 before a length-of-the-field effort from Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow sparked the remarkable comeback, with the fullback starring in the 40-32 Indigenous Round win.<\/p>\n
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Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow is special<\/p>\n
For co-captain Katoa however, despite securing their maiden finals berth, the performance overall left much to be desired, especially with the team having designs on securing a top four finish and to be a genuine title challenger.<\/p>\n
\u201cA rollercoaster is probably the best way to describe that game,\u201d Katoa told NRL.com.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought we started pretty poorly, myself included, I thought just some really, really poor misses, one-on-one tackles, so that’s something I need to work on.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut very, very proud of the fact that we could come back from 24 points to 0 at one stage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt could have been easy for us to kind of go into our shell and let that just keep ticking on, but the way we finally fought that back and just found a way to win \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought after they scored that fourth try, I thought we finally settled down and got back into our groove.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe made it harder for ourselves, but really proud of the way that the boys hung in there and obviously got the win.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\n Isaiya Katoa in action against the Broncos.
\n \u00a9Scott Davis \/ NRL Images
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Next up the Dolphins travel to 4 Pines park to face a Sea Eagles side desperate to correct their recent run of form and force their own way in to the finals.<\/p>\n
The last time the sides met \u2013 Manly handed the Dolphins an embarrassing 52-18 defeat at Kayo Stadium in Round 5.<\/p>\n
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All Tries \u2013 Dolphins v Sea Eagles<\/p>\n
While much has changed since that result, improving their defence in all of their remaining games was a key focus for Katoa.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we\u2019re being serious about going deep in this competition, most teams that win competitions are normally the best defensive side, so we know that we need to be better there,\u201d Katoa said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can’t just try and outscore teams \u2013 we were lucky to get away with it (against the Broncos) \u2013 but we’re thinking going forward we need to be better defensively.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think whilst we are grateful and proud of the fact that we are in the finals series now, I think what’s keeping us grounded is the fact that we know we can be better, we know that we’ve got so much more improvement in us.<\/p>\n
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The best Red Zone plays from Round 23, 2026<\/p>\n
\u201cAlthough we won, we’re probably a little bit disappointed with how we played, and more so disappointed with how we defended.<\/p>\n
\u201cAn aspiration for us now that we’ve made the top eight is go and try and make the top four now.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that most teams that win competitions win it from the top four and when you give yourselves every opportunity to win games like that, the best thing about it is when you’re defending really well, so we know that we’re going to be better there.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know the sky is the limit for us, and we just got to keep striving to be better and hopefully make the top four as well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"History made, finals secured and a rare derby win against the Broncos, but Isaiya Katoa and the Dolphins…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":850068,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-850067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850067","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=850067"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850067\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/850068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=850067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=850067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=850067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}