Warringah coach Darren Coleman believes defence is the key for his side going forward after a strong start to the 2017 season.

The Rats sit in fourth position and have the best attacking record in the competition, but Coleman says there is still plenty to work on at Rat Park.

“I was really pleased with our defence against Parramatta, it was a step in the right direction. We’ve scored enough points this year, we just need more resolution in our defence and we started to see that last week,” he said.

Despite running in seven tries against the Two Blues, Coleman was disappointed with his side’s execution.

“We turned over too much ball in our attacking zone. We scored five tries from 17 entries and that just isn’t good enough.”

The former Eastern Suburbs coach admitted it will be strange to coach against his former club but said he was fully committed to Warringah and expected a tough outing on Saturday.

“It’s going to the tricky. They’ve got a lot more talent then their ladder position suggests and a lot of players with NRC and professional experience. For mine it’s the strongest XV they’ve named to date this season.

“Their last three performances since Randwick have been good and they’ll take confidence from that. They are quite innovative off first phase this year and that’s Morro’s (Craig Morrison) influence.”

After a slow start to the year, Easts have won their last two matches and are now within striking range of the top six.

“It’s been good to win recent games but we’re not carried away by it,” Easts coach Craig Morrison said.

“Reality is we should have won more than three games so far so we are focussed on converting opportunities from here on, something we’ve failed to do in previous matches.”

Morrison said he was wary of Warringah’s attacking threats but said the key for his side was consistency and execution.

“We need to execute better at crucial times. That has cost us at least two games this season.

“We’ve attacked well in some games and defended well in others but really we need to put the two together in an 80 minute performance.”

Warringah and Easts will meet under lights at 7pm at Rat Park on Saturday night.