Twelve months ago in my 2014 season review for the Warriors, I projected that season 2015 would be ‘boom or bust’ for the Warriors. Turns out I was correct in both ways.
After a mixed start to the season the Warriors took advantage of the Origin period by posting six wins from eight games in the middle third of the season and reaching as high as equal fourth on the ladder.
With a solid forward pack built around veterans Simon Mannering and Jacob Lillyman plus Ben Matulino and newcomer Ryan Hoffman – along with an endless stream of talented outside backs – the team looked set for a 2011-esque run.
And then, with sad inevitability, Shaun Johnson busted his ankle. Despite all the talent in the team and despite an outstanding season from five-eighth Chad Townsend, Johnson remains the fulcrum around which everything revolves for the Warriors. The team missed not just his game-breaking brilliance but also his organisational skills as they tumbled down the ladder, losing eight straight games to finish 13th.
But if season 2015 was lamentable on the field it was truly magnificent off it.
The team not only offloaded the millstone that was Sam Tomkins’ ridiculous contract but recruited the best back in the game not named Johnathan and one of the best hookers going around in Isacc Luke.
Season highlight: Round 18 win over Melbourne
Whilst the Storm are no longer quite the juggernaut they were in the salary cap–cheating era them they remain a huge scalp. Their relentless discipline and structure are the very antithesis of the Warriors traditional off-the-cuff style.
As such the Warriors’ gritty win over the Storm in Round 18, in which they held off a determined second half surge from the Melbourne side, seemed to solidify the Warriors as serious contenders in 2015. Sadly it would prove to be a false dawn, and remains the team’s last win of the season.
Season lowlight: Response to the Johnson injury
Losing a player of the quality of Shaun Johnson is always going to make things very challenging, and it probably ended the Warriors hopes of winning the premiership.
However the reality is that at the time of Johnson’s injury the team was still in the eight and with a little fight might have been able to keep themselves there. Instead the team showed all the fortitude of an unsupervised toddler in a lolly shop as they lost their remaining games in generally embarrassing fashion.
The Johnson injury was bad, the team’s response to it was sickening.
Best player: Ben Matulino
Because they are on free-to-air TV so infrequently and because their star players are more often than not fleet-footed backs, the contribution of players such as Matulino and the captain Simon Mannering tends to be overlooked.
But there is no doubt that Ben Matulino is among the very top tier of front row forwards in the competition. In 2015 he was in the top three for average runs and metres gained, along with making a credible 27 tackles on average. He also topped the charts for offloads by a front rower by a considerable margin – whilst only accounting for eight errors all season.
Importantly in a team for which inconsistency appears to be the rule, Matulino is the exception. He did not have a single truly bad game. On no occasion in 2015 did he fail to record double digits in carries or triple digits in metres gained. There was only a single occasion on which he failed to make 20 tackles and two occasions on which he failed to play 50 minutes.
Finally in a team which had the third worst error rate in the competition, his eight errors were spread across seven games – meaning that only once did he make two errors in a game. In a boom or bust team that sort of consistent production is essential bedrock
Roster management
If I offered you the best fullback in the game and a top three dummy half – while getting rid of the worst contract on your books – is that something you might be interested in? With Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Isacc Luke joining the club and Sam Tomkins returning to the miserable isle, the Warriors have undoubtedly won the offseason before it even begins.
Add to that a long list of re-signings including key players Ben Matulino and Manu Vatuvei along with a trio of promising youngsters in Albert Vete, Tuimoala Lolohea and Solomana Kata and the team is building a ferocious roster.
However it is not all good news as the departure of Chad Townsend will leave a genuine vacuum on the left edge. Much like other clubs with dominant playmakers like Johnathan Thurston and Cooper Cronk, the Warriors have long struggled to find an effective complement to Johnson in the halves.
Chad Townsend was far and away the best option the team had developed and indeed he was the more effective of the two in the early part of the season. After some dazzling play at fullback in recent weeks, it seems likely that Tuimoala Lolohea will be given the first crack at the opportunity to partner Johnson.
Prognosis
You can comfortably expect to see coach Andrew McFadden (should the rumours of a Ivan Clearly return prove unfounded) to spend a large part of the offseason in a futile attempt to lower expectations for the team.
He will trot out familiar tropes like ‘need time to gel’ and so on but the reality is that any team with a spine featuring Shaun Johnson, Isacc Luke and Roger Tuivasa-Sheck will rightfully start the season among the favourites.
Even if the team doesn’t win as many games as they’d like, they are a mortal lock to be outrageously entertaining with a “how did he do that?” rating turned up to eleven.
Predicted finish: Top four
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