North Queensland outlasted the New Zealand Warriors in Auckland in a tough, stop-start NRL encounter Warriors coach Tony Kemp claimed was "killed" by the referee.

The Cowboys led for most of a game often interrupted by penalties and finished strongly with two tries for a 32-22 win after the Warriors briefly got their noses in front in the second half.

Interchange player Rod Jensen scored twice for the Cowboys and centre Josh Hannay slotted home five goals, three of them from Warrior penalties.

"That second half wasn't too pretty for anyone but from our point of view we get the two points so we're not that upset about things," Cowboys coach Graham Murray said.

Murray said like the two sides' last encounter at Ericsson Stadium, North Queensland had survived a tough match to hang on a for win.

Warriors coach Kemp said while his team had lacked composure compared with the Cowboys, referee Tony Archer had ruined the match.

"You've got a guy out there who killed a game of rugby league today," Kemp said.

"We couldn't get our momentum today, there was just far too many stoppages from blokes running on the field and that killed the game."

Murray, however, did not think Archer or other NRL referees were being over vigilant on infringements.

"He's got a tough job the ref, he's gotta rule on what he sees straight away," he said.

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