Tanner Stowers-Smith still remembers his first pre-season under Andrew Webster.
It was the end of 2022. A year that included an emotional return to what once was, and yet felt like the start of something new.
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The return of Shaun Johnson brought back memories of better times. Of flashy footwork and dazzling dummies.
And by the middle of the season, the Warriors were back home.
But their previous head coach, Nathan Brown, was no longer there and by the end of the year neither were Reece Walsh, Chanel Harris-Tavita, Eliesa Katoa, Euan Aikten and Jesse Arthars.
There were fresh faces. Luke Mectalf, Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad, Mitch Barnett, Te Maire Martin, Dylan Walker and Marata Niukore were among the more recognisable ones.
There was little fanfare though surrounding the arrival of the unassuming Webster. Although this wasn’t so much an arrival as a return for the former Panthers assistant, who spent two years working under Andrew McFadden.
This time around, however, he was the one calling the shots. This was his team; the hopes of an entire country weighing on his shoulders.
So, the pre-season was the first chance for Webster to really start moulding the playing group to his vision. That started with a simple but cut-throat message.
“In the years prior the club wasn’t playing too well so he brought a new mentality to the team and if you weren’t living up to that criteria he wasn’t afraid to cut you and if you couldn’t play to his standard then you weren’t going play,” Stowers-Smith told foxsports.com.au.
“He was only picking players that were able to do that, so it was a really good mindset change that he brought to the club.
“He made it quite clear what sort of team we were going to be and change into under his coaching.”
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Andrew Webster takes charge at a Warriors training session. Credit: Bodie Friend, warriors.kiwiSource: The Daily Telegraph
Keep in mind Stowers-Smith was only 18 years old at this point and hadn’t even played in the NRL yet, having been recruited by the club ahead of their re-entry into the SG Ball competition in 2023.
So all of this was new to him and looking back at it now, he admitted it was a “big eye-opener”.
“That was probably one of the hardest pre-seasons I’ve done so far,” Stowers-Smith added.
“Maybe just because I wasn’t as fit. But he definitely thrashed us and made us work hard and instilled the belief that hard work can go a long way and it showed with the success we had that year.”
For the first time since 2018, the Warriors were back in the finals and they weren’t just making up the numbers either.
Webster took the Warriors to a top-four finish in his first season in charge, although it wasn’t much of an advantage that year because it meant a date with eventual premiers Penrith in the qualifying finals.
But still, the Warriors rebounded from that loss to reach the preliminary finals for the first time since 2011 and even though they were outclassed by Brisbane, there was a sense that this could be the rule and not the exception under Webster.
That after years of being the NRL’s entertainers and not much more, Webster had set up the foundations for sustainable success.
Webster and now former Warriors halfback Shaun Johnson. (Photo by Fiona Goodall/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
Instead, a disappointing 13th place finish followed in a 2024 season which included a 66-6 loss on the Gold Coast.
So, when the Warriors returned to form last year, it was hard to buy all the way in again.
It’s just a matter of faith, they would say, referring to the six words made famous by Lapi Mariner’s New Zealand sport’s anthem in 2001 and later adopted by Warriors fans as a way to make sense of it all.
One day that faith would be rewarded. It’s now been 31 years since their inception, and finally it feels like that day could be coming.
It may not be this year as another cursed run with injuries looks set to leave Warriors fans wondering what could have been.
But Webster’s hard line approach is once again bringing a consistency out of the Warriors that always seemed to be lacking, even from the most talented teams of years past.
It is a consistency that is only matched by that of the NRL’s most passionate fan base, with the Warriors selling out their home season early last month. Not that it matters anyway given all Warriors games feel like home games.
That is the power of a team that stands for and represents so much more than just itself.
Ahead of Friday night’s match of the round against Penrith, which will be live and exclusive on Fox League and Kayo Sports, foxsports.com.au looks at the identity shift the Warriors have undergone under Webster’s watch and what it means for rugby league in New Zealand, both now and into the future.
The Warriors have taken over. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
THE WEBSTER EFFECT
Any conversation of the Warriors’ turnaround has to start with Webster, because before his arrival there was largely a revolving door of coaches that promised so much but failed to deliver.
In total, the Warriors cycled through six coaches in just over a decade before Webster took over.
He’s now four years into the gig, and it’s no coincidence the last coach to stick around that long was his former mentor at Penrith, Ivan Cleary.
It is also easy to draw similarities between the way the nonchalant Webster and Cleary go about things.
You only have to look at his interview on Fox League’s NRL 360 earlier this week. Webster doesn’t offer much. It’s almost as if every answer is rehearsed.
That isn’t to say he isn’t genuine. In fact, ask any Warriors player and they will tell you the opposite is true behind closed doors — that Webster’s ability to connect with them on a personal level is his superpower as a coach.
But when speaking with media, there is a quiet confidence to Andrew Webster. Every line sounds rehearsed because that’s how in command he is.
Press conferences like the one after the loss to the Sharks are rare. Cleary is similar. Blow-ups are few and far between.
But Webster isn’t a simple carbon copy of Cleary. He has his own secret sauce. His own way of doing things.
Sure, he takes bits and pieces from the previous coaches he has worked under. Why wouldn’t you when that list includes Cleary, Ricky Stuart and Michael Maguire?
That goes to Panthers legend Greg Alexander’s point. He reckons there is a simple reason for Webster’s success.
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Webster during his Tigers days. Picture: Gregg PorteousSource: News Corp Australia
“Andrew was always geared for success as a coach,” Alexander told foxsports.com.au.
“Andrew’s had a lifetime of experience before he finally became a head coach and that’s head coaching elsewhere in the UK. It might have been 20 years in the making.
“There’s no secret to his success… it’s the person he is, the knowledge of the game, the ability to handle situations and they’ve been through it.”
So, what in particular does Webster do well? Ask the Warriors players and the first thing they will tell you according to RNZ journalist Grant Chapman is that he is a “people-first person”.
“You might hear that a lot about coaches, but the players genuinely seem to feel that about him is that he cares about them as people first,” Chapman, who was a foundation Warriors member, told foxsports.com.au.
“That’s a big a big draw card for these guys.”
You only have to hear the way the Warriors players speak about Webster to realise just why that is so important.
Try-scoring machine Alofiana Khan-Pereira, who spent the start of the season in reserve grade, told Sport Nation NZ that Webster has “unlocked some things I didn’t think I had in my game”.
Alofiana Khan-Pereira has gone to another level. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
He’s not the only one to say that either. How about Jackson Ford, who was in contention for the Dally M medal and a State of Origin bolter before a pectoral injury cut his season short?
Ford said he considered giving up rugby league entirely for a career in carpentry after a stint with the Dragons that left him questioning his place in the game.
He didn’t have much on the table outside of a few small offers from the Raiders and Eels. That was, until Webster and the Warriors came calling and like Khan-Pereira, Ford said Webster told him “stuff about myself that I didn’t even know”.
“I was in the Dragons system for a long time and he was telling me stuff that I hadn’t even heard off them boys (like) you’ve got a left-arm carry, I’ve seen you doing this and I think we can fix this up… just some little things,” Ford told SEN Radio.
“It just opened my eyes… I never really had much confidence leaving from that Dragons period. I was always sort of getting told I’m not a first grader so I was just weighing up my options but as soon as I met Webby, I went to the pub and met him and as soon as I had a chat with him I thought, ‘Let’s just have a shot and we’ll head over there and go all in’.”
Chapman called Webster a “real breath of fresh air”, and it helped that he already had those two years serving as assistant coach to McFadden to draw on.
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“He knew exactly what he was stepping into,” added Chapman.
“Because a lot of times, you look at some of the coaches they hire, and the big question is can that coach relate to the culture over here.
“Bearing in mind you also need to bring in that hardened attitude of this professional Australian veteran with some real tangible playoff experience, and Webster’s not only brought that in from a coaching perspective from his time at Penrith, but he’s also brought players across that have got that as well.
“They’re really bought into what he’s preaching.”
That includes Stowers-Smith, who recalled one moment he was pulled into Webster’s office in the 2025 season.
The young front rower “wasn’t playing the footy” he wanted to the year prior, so he turned up in the summer of 2025 as soon as he could and Webster took notice of it.
“He told me to keep doing what I’m doing and make the most of it,” Stowers-Smith added.
Soon enough, he was mixing it with James Fisher-Harris, Mitch Barnett and the rest of the first-team forwards and then early in the 2025 season, he made his debut.
“He just said to bring what I bring and that’s enough and he said that to me to this day – just don’t change a thing of what you bring and that’s what this team needs,” Stowers-Smith said.
It isn’t just the players either. Stowers-Smith said Webster takes the time to involve their partners and families as well, and also has worked closely with James Fisher-Harris to honour the team’s Māori ties.
“He doesn’t just brush it and go, ‘Oh that’s not for me or that’s not my culture, who cares?’ He genuinely wants to know more about it and actually takes care and notice to dive deeper into the meaning behind things and get to actually know the cultural side of things,” Stowers-Smith added.
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THE WARRIORS’ NEW IDENTITY UNDER WEBSTER
On the field, the Warriors have also looked a completely different team under Webster this year.
It is shades of the team that went all the way to the preliminary final in Webster’s first year at the helm.
Gone are the entertainers of old who were no chance of winning if they scored under 20 points.
This Warriors team has conceded more than 20 points on just three occasions this year.
With just five games left to play, that has the Warriors on track to make club history given their previous record for the least games conceding over 20 points in a season was eight.
As it stands, the 16.4 points the Warriors are giving up per game is a club record while their red zone conceded ratio of 14.5 (how many tackles opposition teams need to score against them in the 20) is the second-best mark in the competition only behind Penrith.
“I think that’s been a characteristic of Webster’s team is they like getting in the grind, they try and wear down the opposition and then take advantage of any opportunities that come out of that,” Chapman said.
Former Kiwis international Jared Waerea-Hargreaves told foxsports.com.au it is clear the Warriors are “enjoying the hard parts of the game” under Webster.
“I just look at the style of footy, and it just looks like they like getting down and dirty,” he added.
“There’s a real toughness about this Warriors side.”
The Warriors are flying. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
Toughness isn’t a word that would usually be associated with the Warriors. But that goes to the heart of their transformation under Webster, and it is four of the new recruits he brought to the club who are leading the way.
“We play a full different brand of footy now and the way we work as a team is completely different which I’m really enjoying,” Stowers-Smith said, pointing to Fisher-Harris, Erin Clark, Kurt Capewell and Mitch Barnett as examples of it on the field.
“We strive with ourselves on our effort areas and playing a hard-nosed brand of footy.”
It is not as if the Warriors have abandoned their attack either. After all, they are averaging the third-most points (28.3) in the competition.
They are just scoring in a different way under Webster. It is no longer the expansive, offload-happy style of football from the unpredictable Warriors teams of old.
The emphasis is on a power game upfront and then the rest of it flows from there.
You don’t have to look far to see the effectiveness of it either, with the Warriors running for 1,971 metres in their big win over the Titans last week. It was the most they had managed in a non-golden point game and second-highest ever on record.
Their completion rate of 83.1 per cent, meanwhile, is the best in the league while the Warriors rank 13th for offloads, which comes as a surprise given they are usually associated with a high-risk, high-reward brand of football.
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The Warriors are playing tough footy. (Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
But again, Webster has simplified the approach since taking over and crucially, instead of stifling their attack it has only given the Warriors more try-scoring opportunities with the club ranking first in tackles inside the opposition 20 this year.
Meanwhile, they are third overall in points scored, fourth in linebreaks and fourth in total run metres.
“At the start of every year everyone says this is the Warriors’ year,” Chapman said.
But maybe this is actually the year? It certainly feels like it according to Chapman.
“Put it this way, I’m seriously starting to plan coming over for the grand final,” he said.
“I actually think our women’s team could make the NRLW final as well. It does feel like that. “I think a lot of that has to do with the young talent that’s coming through in that team. The one little asterisk against it is that like last year when the Warriors were looking good, they’ve they suffered a couple of key season ending injuries, and the same thing’s happened again this year.
“So if they can overcome that, and so far it looks like they have the talent to do that, how that translates at the business end of the season remains to be seen. But I know there’s a lot of faith in the players coming through.”
THE BIG EXPANSION DEBATE
There is plenty of faith in the fanbase too. More than any other team in the NRL.
You only had to look at Magic Round, which sees tens of thousands of fans descend upon Suncorp Stadium. Although this year, it was largely a see of blue, red and green.
The Warriors cashed in by starting a pop-up store in Queen’s Street, even if they weren’t technically supposed to.
They were fined $10,000 a day for it according to Matty Johns. But it didn’t matter. They were happy to pay it. Why?
“They were making $100,000 in merchandise sales every day,” Johns declared.
Even when they last played the Panthers at CommBank Stadium earlier this year, any semblance of support for Penrith was drowned out by Warriors chants.
At this point, it doesn’t feel like there is such a thing as an ‘away game’ when it comes to the Warriors. “It’s pretty crazy,” Stowers-Smith said.
It begs the question: is a second New Zealand team the logical next step for the NRL as it looks to bring a 20th team into the competition by 2030?
Should New Zealand have a second team? (Photo by Andy Jackson/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
The answer is far from straightforward. Webster’s response to a question on the matter after the Warriors’ win at Christchurch earlier this year was proof of that.
“I feel we have enough talent in this country to have five teams, so talent is not an issue, talent from that area is not an issue,” he said.
“I suppose you have to ask Christchurch do they want to keep following the Warriors or do they want their own team? You have to ask them that, because there’s no point putting the team in there, if everyone’s still supporting the Warriors.
“I just struggle personally, because I really enjoy the fact that the top of the (country) to the bottom are Warriors fans and they love their team.
“We never used to have that, but we’ve got the whole country behind us now, not just the region.
“Will it have that same feeling if we add a team? I’m not sure.”
Even Panthers coach Ivan Cleary shared similar concerns ahead of this Friday’s game, telling reporters “the main thing is to consolidate the Warriors”.
“But the more and more I think about it, there’s a pretty good chance (a second team) might be over here,” he added.
“The game is growing, it’s just (about) that balance between expanding too quickly and consolidating what’s gone well so far.”
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Chapman said there is a “blueprint” to follow in the men’s A-League, although that in itself gives credence to the Warriors’ concern given the Wellington Phoenix followed up a second-place result with 11th and 8th-place finishes following Auckland FC’s inception.
“So to me, that kind of indicates what could happen with the Warriors if the second team came into New Zealand. Suddenly you’ve got a second team kind of undercutting them,” Chapman said.
Alexander was the marquee signing for the Warriors during their inaugural season and said it was “something I didn’t think was real”.
“It was the excitement in New Zealand having their first side come into the NRL was remarkable. The whole country was behind the Warriors coming in,” he added.
With that in mind, he said New Zealand is the “ideal place” to have another team and former Kiwis enforcer Waerea-Hargreaves agreed.
“It’s a must,” he said.
“The game is thriving in New Zealand. It’s the strongest it’s ever been in our game, and we’ve only seen a couple of months ago when the Warriors took a home game down to Christchurch that they got a sellout stadium.
“I definitely think the game and the country’s screaming for a second team because it’s never been in a better position.”
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The game is thriving. NRL PHOTOSSource: The Daily Telegraph
So, why not ask the hometown boy himself. Stowers-Smith, who is from Christchurch, said it is “a bit of a controversial subject” and could see both sides to the debate.
He, like Warriors CEO Cameron George, would like to see more of an emphasis placed on investing in domestic pathways first before turning attention to a second New Zealand team.
“It’s a hard one because especially for me, it would be so cool to have an expansion team within New Zealand, especially if it was down from where I’m from,” Stowers-Smith said.
“It’d be amazing for the game but at the same time I feel like we’re we’ve building something so great here within New Zealand and within the Warriors, I feel like it might divide New Zealand into two which I don’t think is the right way to go about it.
“But in saying that it would be great for that to happen and for New Zealand Rugby League.”
Regardless of whether it happens or not, it will be at least three or four years before the Warriors’ position as the hottest ticket in town is under threat.
They are already locked into the top eight for another season, making it the first time since 2010-11 that the Warriors will be playing finals football for two-straight years.
That, it just so happens, was also the last time they made the grand final. So, will history repeat?
Serious injuries to Tanah Boyd, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Jackson Ford won’t help, but Stowers-Smith has “full faith” the Warriors can go all the way.
“We know what we’re capable of and we have full faith to go the whole way with the squad that we have,” he said.
“We’ve had some massive losses with three of our best players but we still have that 100 per cent faith to take into the playoffs and not just go there to make up the numbers but take everything out.”
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