Head coach Andrew Webster, who turned the team’s fortunes around in that incredible 2023 season, said securing Harris’ long-term future was a huge boost ahead of the 2024 campaign. Tohu Harris, the inspirational captain of the Warriors, has committed to staying with the team through the 2025 campaign.December 3, 2023
This season, the inspiring Harris not only played in his 200th career game but also his 100th for the New Zealand Warriors, leading them to their first preliminary final in 12 years.December 4, 2023
Inspirational Warriors captain Tohu Harris has committed to play on for an eighth season at the club, with a fresh contract extension for the 2025 NRL season.
Harris, who will turn 32 in January, was off-contract at the end of the upcoming 2024 season, meaning rival clubs would have been able to approach his management since the first of November this year.
An NRL premiership winner with the Melbourne Storm in 2017, Harris was one of the Warriors’ best during the 2023 season, that saw the club break its finals drought and advance all the way to a Preliminary Final – a match lost to the Brisbane Broncos
Re-committing to the club for 2025, a year that will be the veteran’s 13th in the NRL and putting pen to paper for just a single year, could well point to Harris contemplating finishing his exceptional career at the Warriors after the 2025 season.
The man who transformed the club’s fortunes during that outstanding 2023 season, head coach Andrew Webster, said securing Harris’ long-term future was a major boost ahead of the 2024 campaign.
“Without him and his leadership on and off the field we certainly wouldn’t be where we are right now,” he said.
“He’s an unbelievable player and person who means so much to our club.”
Webster, who was previously an assistant coach to now recruitment boss Andrew McFadden in 2015 and 2016, spoke with Harris before taking on the head coaching role last season and said the industrious lock or middle forward impressed him with his passion and what he wants for the club.
“He proved that throughout the last season and now he has the opportunity to take the team further as we seek more improvement,” Webster said.
Having Harris locked in for 2025 will be a huge boost to Webster given the uncertainty around whether Addin Fonua-Blake will be at the club beyond next season after previously asking for a release on compassionate grounds before agreeing to stay on for 2024.
