30 Mar 2016

Lillyman reaches NRL milestone

12:00 pm on 30 March 2016
Warriors prop Jacob Lillyman

Warriors prop Jacob Lillyman Photo: Photosport

The New Zealand Warriors have named an unchanged side from Monday's win over the Knights for Sunday's National Rugby League match against the Sydney Roosters in Gosford.

Prop Jacob Lillyman will play his 150th game for the New Zealand club as they seek their second win of the season.

Lillyman becomes just the 11th player to make 150 NRL appearances for the Auckland based club.

It's the second significant milestone in nine months for the 11-game Queensland Origin forward after making his 200th career appearance against Canberra last June.

On Sunday he'll draw level with fellow Queenslander Micheal Luck as the only other Australian in the Warriors' 150 club; Luck played 150 times from 2006-2012 before retiring.

While Lillyman prepares for a special moment in his eighth season since joining the club in 2009, fullback Roger Tuivasa-Sheck faces one in his debut campaign when he comes up against his old Roosters side for the first time.

"These are two big moments for Jake and Tui," said Warriors assistant coach Andrew Webster.

"Jake is hugely popular around the team and can always be counted on to perform at a consistently high level.

"Roger has been great for us since the start of the season and went better again against the Knights. His combinations are really developing and we're seeing the benefits of what he provides for us."

Webster said there was room for satisfaction over beating the Knights for the first win of the year but the quality of the overall performance wasn't up to expectations.

"We felt we played a lot better when we lost to Brisbane and Melbourne in our previous two games," he said.

"There are a lot of areas we need to improve in when we take on the Roosters. We were just too sloppy at times."

Centre Solomone Kata and Albert Vete, who started at loose forward, came out of the win over the Knights with leg knocks, but Webster said there was confidence both would be able to play against the Roosters.

Simon Mannering has again been named to start in the second row with Vete at loose forward.

Warriors 150 appearances:

261 Stacey Jones (1995-2005 & 2009)

240 Simon Mannering (2005-2016)

213 Manu Vatuvei (2004-2016)

195 Logan Swann (1997-2003 & 2007-2008)

185 Lance Hohaia (2002-2011)

177 Ben Matulino (2008-2016)

170 Awen Guttenbeil (1996-2006)

169 Sam Rapira (2006-2015)

159 WairangiKoopu (1999 & 2001-2008)

150 Micheal Luck (2006-2012)

150 Jacob Lillyman (2009-2016)

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