Greg Inglis says his reconstructed left knee felt good after his long-awaited NRL comeback, but South Sydney's poor defensive effort caused him plenty of pain.
The Anthony Seibold era at the Rabbitohs started off with a whimper after the team were comprehensively outplayed in a 32-20 loss to the NZ Warriors in Perth on Saturday.
Seibold lamented his team's low 68 per cent completion rate, while they also missed 25 tackles on the way to conceding six tries.
Inglis was solid without starring in his first NRL game back from a knee reconstruction, recording 110 run metres.
But it wasn't nearly enough to inspire the Rabbitohs to victory.
Inglis, playing at centre, said he didn't give a second thought to his knee during the match.
"You can't go into games thinking about that, otherwise it would just get your mind off what you're supposed to do out there," Inglis said.
"I know I've done all the preparation and training I can to get myself right for this round and punch out 80 (minutes).
"I pulled up fine. Just a bit of cramp coming in. But the knee, body - everything is fine."
Inglis said the team's defensive performance against NZ was unacceptable, and something that needs addressing ahead of next Saturday's clash with the Panthers.
"We're not going to win games on the back of a defensive performance like that," Inglis said.
"I know it's round one, but we've got to be better than that."
Seibold agreed, and his message to his players was blunt after the match.
"As I said to the players in there. It's black and white - you can't have 85 per cent effective contact and expect to win against any team in the competition," Seibold said.
"You can't complete at 68 per cent ... and expect to compete as well.
"Some of that's down to poor decision making or not being effective enough from a contact point of view.
"But at the end of the day, the Warriors ran harder than us and they got their body in front more aggressively than us. That's what's more disappointing to me."
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