NRL pundits have hit out at the mentality of players and coaches opting to leave NZ Warriors, rather than relocate to live in New Zealand.
Teen sensation Reece Walsh has become the latest in an ever-growing list to want out of the club and has been granted an early release from his contract to stay in Brisbane.
Walsh joins utility Euan Aitken in departing the club at the end of the current season, rather than relocate to New Zealand, while prop Matt Lodge and former coach Nathan Brown chose to sever their ties with immediate effect.
Speaking on Fox Sport's NRL 360, former Queensland State of Origin forward Billy Moore has hit out at the character of those wanting to leave and urged the Warriors to build a squad intent on representing its community.
"The Warriors are now back in reality," Moore said. "They're a New Zealand-based franchise, they're based over there.
"They need people who want to live and assimilate into the community, [become] part of the fabric over there.
"There's been a group of players obviously that have used it as a bit of a transit lounge, a bit of a cash grab.
"They've got to get back to the mindset of, 'we're a New Zealand-based franchise, we represent the community here'."
Fellow pundit Yvonne Sampson joined the chorus critical of those not wanting to relocate, after the Warriors were credited with helping save the NRL, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020.
Since moving to Australia, the Warriors are now onto their fourth coach and looking for a fifth, after Brown's departure in June.
With the team back on home soil fulltime from 2023, they can at least draw a line in the sand in determining who's in and who's out.
"When you think nearly three years ago, the Warriors packed up and left home to save the integrity of this NRL premiership," Sampson said.
"Since then, they've gone through Stephen Kearney, Todd Payten and Nathan Brown, and now Stacey Jones is in charge.
"It's hard to sell a club when you don't know who's coaching and you don't know where you're going to live.
"Now they know they're going back home, there's been such an instability for the Warriors.
"I feel sorry for them. I feel people said, 'yep, I'll play for the Warriors. Oh, now I've got to go and live in New Zealand? No thanks'.
"It's crazy. It doesn't make sense."
