Addin Fonua-Blake looks set to miss his clash with his former club Manly as the Warriors recruit awaits scans on a knee injury.
Fonua-Blake left the field after just 13 minutes in the Warriors’ 32-12 loss to the Sydney Roosters on Friday night, and didn’t return due to the knee pain.
The Tongan prop’s return bout with Manly would have been one of the most anticipated clashes of round five, given the way he makes every battle personal.
But that is now almost certain to be denied.
The Warriors have the minimum five-day turnaround into the match, and coach Nathan Brown has admitted he does not expect him to recover.
“I don’t know what Addin’s problem is but when blokes of his toughness come off there’s a problem,” Brown said.
“Hopefully, it’s only a minor one and he doesn’t miss too much.
“I would be highly surprised if he was going to play. Just looking at the fact he came off five or 10 minutes in and wasn’t able to go back on.”
The Warriors have another issue in Jazz Tevaga’s ankle, but they do hold more confidence in that.
On the field, defence is a far bigger concern for the Warriors.
They sit at 2-2 after a tough start to the season including last year’s top-eight sides Canberra, Newcastle and the Roosters to go with rising force Gold Coast.
But despite claiming a win over an injury-ravaged Raiders last week, the Warriors have now conceded 30 in each of their last two games.
“It does (worry me), but we are playing top-four teams,” Brown said.
“It is too many points. When we’ve come up against top-four sides it shows we have some work to do.
“We’ve played four pretty fair sides and we’ve won two and lost two.
“Even though the score suggested it was a reasonably close game (against the Roosters), they played a lot faster than us.
“So I still think we have a way to go to catch up to those sides.”
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