NRL: Nowhere to hide come Monday

Warrior Nathan Friend says coach Andrew McFadden doesn't mince his words during the video review. Photo / Getty Images

Win or lose, no one at the Warriors looks forward to Monday.

It's usually the day when the team assemble for the video review of the previous game, and such sessions are very different since Andrew McFadden took charge.

Where once there was an accentuate-the-positive approach and mistakes might be glossed over, now there is nowhere to hide.

"If you do something wrong on the field, you might be thinking, 'oh shit, this isn't going to look good in the video session'," said Ben Matulino.

"Before you got away with a lot of stuff but Cappy [McFadden] doesn't let anything slide. If you do something wrong, you have to answer to it in front of the team. It might take you out of your comfort zone, but you have to do it."

It wouldn't have been a pleasant experience after last week's big loss to the Roosters.

"He's quite honest and doesn't sugarcoat too many things," Thomas Leuluai said. "He doesn't go overboard, but wants players to understand the consequences when they don't do their jobs and how that affects the team."

The team and support staff assemble in the War Room, a specially constructed area at the back of the Warriors gym. There's a large projector screen and a mini grandstand where the players sit. It's an open forum, with players expected to justify what they were - or weren't - doing at a particular time, although McFadden and senior players tend to do most of the talking.

McFadden is nowhere near the level of a Craig Bellamy, Des Hasler or Ricky Stuart, who can be ferocious in their approach, but doesn't mince words.

"He is straight up," said Nathan Friend. "Cappy is on the front foot and will point out exactly what happened. It's completely different to what happened in the past. He doesn't stand up in front of us and waffle on for half an hour. It used to be like that and you would walk out and wonder, 'what did we get out of that?' Cappy gets to the point."

McFadden sees it as a necessary learning process, although admits last week's review wasn't overly complex.

"We didn't have to watch too much because it was a bit same, same throughout," he said.

"Generally, though, it's about learning how things could have been done better. You have to acknowledge that, otherwise you will never move on." Leuluai added: "Nobody wants errors but they will come - everybody drops the ball at some stage. It's the attitude ones, when guys aren't getting back onside, or chasing, or covering, that are hard to take. They can be embarrassing."