Johnathan Thurston warns Cowboys could lose to Warriors if they don't lift their game Johnathan Thurston has warned the Cowboys they must rapidly improve or face losing to the Warriors. IF the premiership reality check wasn't enough, North Queensland skipper Johnathan Thurston has warned his men they could cop the ultimate insult next: being walloped by the winless Warriors. After labelling his team premiership pretenders following the 34-6 loss to Newcastle, Thurston believes the Cowboys face further embarrassment on Monday night in New Zealand unless they remedy their poor completion rate and turnstile defence of the past fortnight. The Cowboys completed 24 of 36 against the Knights and were just as bad in the 32-10 round two loss to Melbourne where they had 26 of 38 completions. It is this inability to get through their tackles and build pressure which has Thurston concerned about a trip to Auckland, where they have not won since 2009. While the Warriors are yet to score a first-half point in three floggings this season, Thurston does not want the vulnerable Cowboys to become the first scalp of the team across the Tasman. "It was a total disappointment, we couldn't hold on to the ball and that just made it difficult for ourselves," Thurston said of last week's effort. We couldn't defend really well either, so no doubt the Warriors will be licking their lips and thinking they can put 40 or 50 on us. We really have to knuckle down this week and turn it around. They've got talent right across the park they have a wealth of talent coming through their system. They're all starting to crack into grade now and they've got some experience helping them. You know a win for them is not too far away and hopefully it's not this week. The Cowboys do not have much time on the paddock to get things right this week, with two days lost completely with travel from Newcastle to Townsville and then again across to Auckland. While Thurston has delivered some home truths in the wake of the Knights loss, it's nothing the players weren't already aware of behind closed doors as they attempt a swift change in fortunes. As is always the case with a team boasting attacking stars like Thurston and Matt Bowen, it won't take much to trigger another run of sparkling form. "I think when you play like that for everyone it hits home pretty quickly," Thurston said. We've put ourselves in this hole and we need to dig ourselves out. We're a good footy team, we just need to get our mojo back and once we do that we will be fine. When you're dropping the ball like we did you're always on the back foot. When the going got tough we couldn't hang in there and they put us to the sword. We've got a lot of work to do and it's a long year but we hope we can turn it around.