{"id":329348,"date":"2023-09-08T05:25:14","date_gmt":"2023-09-08T05:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=329348"},"modified":"2023-09-08T08:01:43","modified_gmt":"2023-09-08T08:01:43","slug":"two-words-knights-wont-consider-in-title-defence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=329348","title":{"rendered":"Two words Knights won't consider in title defence"},"content":{"rendered":"

Newcastle Knights<\/a> NRLW coach Ronald Griffiths has admitted his side haven't given the minor premiership a thought this season as his prepares to do battle with former teammate Millie Boyle<\/a> this weekend.<\/p>\n

The Knights and Roosters<\/a> are locked in a battle for the title, both sitting on 12 points at the top of the table, while the Titans are still in with a chance with two games left in the regular season.<\/p>\n

As his side attempts to defend it's premiership win from last year, Griffiths was strong on what his side wants to earn this season.<\/p>\n

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"Never speak about \ufeffit (the minor premiership), haven't spoken about, probably won't to be honest," he told Wide World of Sports.<\/p>\n

"The one thing, and we haven't touched on it, I think first and foremost the one thing we want to do is make sure we qualify for the semi finals which we're close to doing, and then try and get a home semi final.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"From our perspective it'd be marvellous to get a home semi, it'd be the first of its kind for our NRLW team."<\/p>\n

With the Roosters having an almost perfect season, with only one loss and a points differential of 156, the side is the short-priced favourite to lift the trophy in October.<\/p>\n

For Boyle, that grand final weekend is the main focus.<\/p>\n

"Whoever ends up winning this game, pretty \ufeffconfident that we'll still go through both as one or two, depending on what happens next week," she said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"But look it's an important game but at the end of the day everyone wants to be playing the October long weekend so whatever happens this weekend doesn't really mean much in the grand scheme of things.<\/p>\n

"We've had teams get the minor premiership and often that means they've got knocked off so it doesn't really mean too much in the grand scheme of things."<\/p>\n

Saturday's clash won't be the first time Boyle has faced a number of her former teammates, after playing \ufeffagainst them in March with the Central Coast Roosters in the NSW Women's Premiership.<\/p>\n

Stream the NRLW premiership 2023 live and free on<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Played at Cessnock, the Roosters claimed a 20-10 victory \ufeffbut it was a fixture the forward almost didn't feature in.<\/p>\n

"It was a \ufefftough game, it was probably going to be tough regardless though, I'd just come off a trip in Tasmania actually, it was a really a last-minute call-up that I needed to play," Boyle explained.<\/p>\n

"It was going to be a tough game regardless but obviously playing against former teammates factored into it as well."<\/p>\n

The top of the table clash will be the second game in a double-header at McDonald Jones Stadium with the Tigers and Broncos playing before them.<\/p>\n

Both games will be shown live and free on Nine and 9Now<\/a>, leading into the two Saturday \ufeffNRL finals, starting with the Panthers v Warriors day game, which kicks off at 4.05pm.<\/p>\n

Newcastle's elimination final fixture against the Raiders will follow the next afternoon, which Griffiths described as a "great weekend of rugby league" in the town. \ufeff<\/p>\n

"Any chance to get to \ufeffplay one, at home, is always a great occasion and two it's a NRLW double header, it's going to be a great weekend of rugby league in Newcastle," he said.<\/p>\n

"It's rugby league heartland, so to have two NRLW games on the end of semi-finals, the excitement will be palpable.<\/p>\n

\"NRLW<\/p>\n

"The thing with Newcastle, regardless how they're going, as long as you \ufeffput a performance out there that's full of grit, they don't care about the result too much. Yeah they like to win but as long as you've got plenty of grit about the way you play they'll always support you.<\/p>\n

"That's been regular since 1988 when the Knights first entered the competition."<\/p>\n

The Roosters come into the game off the back of a strong 46-12 win over the Eels while Newcastle had to battle hard to defeat Canberra 20-12 after trailing 10-0 at half-time.<\/p>\n

Griffiths said the strong start from the Raiders was exactly what he expected.<\/p>\n

"We were very happy with our performance, we thought the Raiders started very strong \ufeffand we went down there with the mindset that they would," he said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"One they'd never been beaten at home before, and two they got beaten the week before so we had no doubt their review would've been quite challenging on Tuesday night so there's two reasons why.<\/p>\n

"And the third one was when you're fortunate enough or when you're winning competitions, teams are always coming to get you when they play you so there was three reasons why we thought they were going to be up for it and they were.<\/p>\n

"What we took out of it from our perspective is we were under a fair bit of pressure early on and in the second half our defensive DNA came to the fore.<\/p>\n

"I think that's an important point from our perspective and I know our staff certainly need a big rap for instilling that DNA and the players need a big rap for driving it and coming to the fore at the back end of the game."<\/p>\n

This weekend's blockbuster fixture will also pit Knights winger Jasmin Strange against her dad, John Strange, coach of the Roosters.<\/p>\n

Nine's bumper coverage of Saturday's rugby league will continue when the Panthers play the Warriors at 4\ufeff:05pm followed by the Sharks and Roosters at 7:50pm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Newcastle Knights NRLW coach Ronald Griffiths has admitted his side haven't given the minor premiership a thought this season as his prepares to do battle […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":329352,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329348"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=329348"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329348\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":329358,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329348\/revisions\/329358"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/329352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=329348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=329348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=329348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}