Warriors coach Andrew Webster says he has full faith in the NRL’s match officials, stating: “there’s not one part of us that thinks the referees are going out there to purposefully hurt the Warriors' opportunity to win a game of football”.
Webster, speaking on a media call from Sydney where the Warriors are preparing to play the Bulldogs on Friday night, said the recent furore about the officials on both sides of the Tasman had not been addressed because no one closely connected with the team was talking about it.
“For me the stance I’ve been taking is that we’ve got to continue to get better, we’re not going to be victims, we’ve got to look at ourselves," he said.
"The pleasing thing for me is that we’ve got a group of players who want that too.”
Webster was talking in the wake of social media comments by Jason Paris, the chief executive of the Warriors’ main sponsor One NZ, who suggested the team had been “cheated” out of games by referees and their assistants.
Paris yesterday doubled down on his claims in media interviews and called for an investigation by the NRL into 50-50 decisions which he said had consistently gone against the Warriors over the last three years.
NRL boss Graham Annesley described the comments as “unacceptable”, saying he was “hot under the collar” about someone questioning the integrity of his officials.
While Webster said he admired the “passion” of his teams sponsors and fans, he added he didn’t think there was a conscious or unconscious bias against his team.
“I don’t buy into that. I feel the better you play the luckier you get.”
Webster added: “I don’t think there’s an NRL coach who hasn’t been upset that things didn’t go differently for them. I get frustrated like everyone.
“I want to be clear on this and I want to go on the record as saying it: there’s not one part of us that thinks the referees are going out there to purposefully hurt the Warriors opportunity to win a game of football.
“Their integrity should remain intact and they’re doing a great job. There’s times when I get frustrated like any coach, but I want to be clear that that’s not our stance.”
Webster said he had asked the NRL for clarification on several calls during last weekend’s loss to the Panthers like he had several times already this season and that after three defeats the Warriors were just concentrating on getting better, a message echoed by skipper Tohu Harris.
“In terms of the players, we’re only focusing on the things that we can control and there are some things in our performance that we need to get right so that those sorts of 50-50 calls don’t come into the game,” Harris said.
“The referee’s job is a tough job. I certainly don’t envy the position they’re in, but, again, we’ve got to make it easier on ourselves.”
Harris, back on the field against the Panthers after re-injuring a knee against the Storm recently, added: “We can’t buy into it [match officials controversy]. We can’t start feeling sorry for ourselves because once we start doing that… you just get a team that feels hard done by all the time.”
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