The Penrith Panthers were comfortably the most disappointing team in the opening round of the season.
After making it to Week 2 of the finals last year, reaching the grand final of the Auckland Nines, and recruiting strongly, the hype has built steadily at the foot of the mountains for 2017.
Posted as joint premiership favourites by most bookmakers, to lose so dramatically to a team that has struggled to score in recent seasons was incredibly surprising.
After learning to deal with pressure and hype at the end of last season, it looked a case of some mental demons derailing the Panthers.
As good as the Dragons were, Penrith donated plenty of errors, possession and territory to the home side and paid for it dearly. It looked the product of either complacency or being overwhelmed – neither are good for a team going into Round 1.
Anthony Griffin will be confident that he has the talent in his squad to play finals football, but he has to stomp out those nerves or complaceny to get that talent to the fore.
There are plenty of talented sides in the NRL that don’t make it to the finals, and that is down to mental toughness and control. The Warriors and Tigers at their best last season were a joy to watch but getting them there was a lottery. The Warriors demonstrated their best on Sunday, but complacency meant they were down with ten minutes to go before winning it late. The Tigers were solid against the Rabbitohs on Friday but at the back-end of last season they couldn’t find another win that would have seen them play finals football.
A week is a long time in football and Round 2 will be a much better indication of how the Panthers will fare in 2017. They have a week to stew on their embarrassing loss and get back to the fundamentals that saw them make the finals last year.
The name of the game will be running hard, controlling the football and making their tackles. Three things they failed to do on Saturday.
It will be a long season for the Panthers if they can’t start with the basics and build into the talented and exciting football team we saw in 2016.
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