• North Queensland winger Antonio Winterstein expressed the frustration he and his Toyota Cowboys teammates felt after their second straight four-point loss on Saturday night. “It’s very frustrating because we know we’ve got it in ourselves to lock these games away but silly errors in our own half, a few silly penalties and not holding the ball when we should are really costing us,” Winterstein said. “It’s grinding footy that we need to get ourselves into. It’s tough but we’ve done the training to do it. Hopefully next week we can turn it around.” The Samoan World Cup representative felt the disappointment more than most after an unfortunate trip with a try beckoning cost the Cowboys what had appeared to be a certain four points in the first half. “The boys did brilliantly to set me up and I just couldn’t execute,” he said. “That’s four points down the drain.” However he did make up for it only minutes later by bumping off three Warriors defenders in a run to the line. “I was pretty frustrated there,” he said. “Morgs gave me a good pass right on the chest and I wasn’t going to waste it.”
• A strong night in both attack and defence won Tariq Sims the coaches’ vote as Cowboys player of the match against the Warriors on Saturday night. Playing in the No.13 jersey for the first time, Sims ran for 138 metres in 13 hit-ups and pulled off 35 tackles in his 61 minutes of playing time. He also finished with a broken nose in a tackle on the Warriors’ goal line in the dying stages. The other award winners from Saturday night were: NRL play of the day – Kyle Feldt for his try; NYC player of the match – rookie forward Bill Cullen; and NYC play of the day – Alex Grant for his try-saving tackle on runaway Warriors centre David Fusitua.
• With nine days between their round three and round four matches, the Cowboys NRL squad has two full days off this week. There’s no training on Wednesday or Saturday before they head to the Gold Coast on Sunday afternoon.
• The Cowboys will be part of a special announcement involving James Cook University and the NRL on Tuesday morning. We’ll have the details on cowboys.com.au just after 11am.
• It looks like Matt Scott will be visiting home during the middle of this year’s State of Origin series. The XXXX Queensland Maroons are set to once again visit rural Queensland as part of their 2014 campaign, with drought-devastated Longreach to host a fan day for Mal Meninga’s team on Tuesday 10 June. The Cowboys co-captain hails from nearby Ilfracombe and is a near-certainty to again be the Maroons’ squad this year.
• Our stats leaders from Saturday night were: most metres – Kyle Feldt (162m); most tackles – Rory Kostjasyn (38); most tackle breaks – Antonio Winterstein (6); most linebreaks – Kyle Feldt and Antonio Winterstein (2); most try assists – Michael Morgan (2); most linebreak assists – Michael Morgan (3).
• Joel Riethmuller will try to match Kane Linnett’s trickshot success from last week in the WIN News Locker Room on Wednesday night – tune in from 7pm. Meanwhile, Kyle Feldt will join Ashton Sims on Cliffo and Tianna's breakfast show on Hot FM in Townsville on Wednesday morning.
• This week’s birthday boy is NRL squad member Javid Bowen who turns 21 on Sunday. A belated happy birthday goes to our oldest current Cowboy Glenn Hall, whose 33rd birthday on Friday slipped through without a mention last week.
• You’ll be able to check on the progress of the Cowboys who are currently playing with the Mackay Cutters when the reigning Intrust Super Cup premiers take on unbeaten Norths on Channel Nine/WIN in Queensland on Sunday. The telecast kicks off at 2pm and will be repeated later in the week on Fox Sports.
• NYC squad member Cooper Bambling again made it on to the try-scorers’ list for the Townsville Stingers in their 22-12 win against the Mackay Cutters in the Mal Meninga Cup at the weekend. The Stingers remain on the top of their pool on eight points, two ahead of the Central Crows and Sunshine Coast Falcons.
• Around 120 girls were able to enjoy a day of rugby league action in Mackay on Friday. Unfortunately the forecast of wet weather led to the postponement of the Cowboys Schoolgirls Challenge until Wednesday week, but some shortened matches were still played for those teams who were in Mackay to take part in the tournament.
• The winner of a signed 2014 Cowboys jersey in our game day competition from Saturday night's game is Christine Newton – look out for the game day comp again at Cowboys v Knights on Monday 7 April.
• Look out for the brand new Cowboys Spirit 2014 poster at a home game very soon, all thanks to Ribs and Rumps.
