Titans captain, Georgia Hale made the most tackles on the field for New Zealand, but she still wasn’t happy.
The Titans forward and Kiwi Ferns co-captain says her side got lucky in an 18-12 win over Fiji in their Women’s Rugby League World Cup opener at McDonald Jones Stadium in Newcastle yesterday.
Hale started at hooker, as she did for the Titans this season, before moving to her usual position as a running forward through the middle of the field.
She played 50 minutes and made 32 tackles, the most of any New Zealand player, along with eight runs for 69 metres.
But Hale said Fiji, playing their first World Cup, had caught the Ferns off guard.
“They were relentless, they kept coming, they played like they had nothing to lose, and they tested our waters for sure,” she said.
“To be fair, we didn’t have the opportunity to really analyse what we were coming up against, but what we’d done through the week in terms of our prep and our purpose and what we wanted to focus on, it was on us, and we went far away from our blueprint today.”
Winger Stacey Waaka scored in the second minute to put New Zealand ahead 4-0, but strong Fijian defence kept the Ferns out of good field position.
Fiji led 12-4 until Waaka’s second try just before half-time cut the gap to 12-10.
Five-eighth Zahara Temara kicked two late penalty goals, and winger Leianne Tufuga scored three minutes from full-time to seal the win.
Hale said the result hid a performance well below the Ferns’ standards.
“Everything was in our control, then we completely lost control,” she said.
“It was very uncharacteristic in patches, doing someone else’s job, ill-discipline, untidy play.
“What we wanted to achieve today was really basic – it was setting the tone of the tournament by being physical and going forward (but) we just went far away from that.
“It’s not us, it’s not the brand of footy that we want to play, and we had to work extremely hard on the back of that to try to make up for it.”
She didn’t hold back in her assessment of the win.
“It was just luck in the end,” Hale said.
“We definitely didn’t work hard enough to flush it, forget it, and turn a corner to the direction we wanted to play.”
Meanwhile, Kiwi Ferns coach Ricky Henry pointed to the defensive workload his side carried.
“I think we made 50 more tackles than them, so our petrol tank was down as well,” Henry said.
“But again, I felt like we fought our way back, we found a way to get back into the game, and found a way to win the game.
“We’ll take that away, and obviously there’s some things that we need to work on.”
Henry also praised a Fiji side packed with NRLW players.
“It might be Fiji and their first time in the World Cup, but they’re a good team,” he said.
New Zealand won the first three Women’s World Cups and are seen as clear second favourites behind three-time defending champions Australia.
The Kiwi Ferns host France at One NZ Stadium in Christchurch on Sunday at 1pm (AEST/Queensland), after the French lost 58-4 to Papua New Guinea in their opener.
