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On Saturday, the hearts of the large majority of the 13,725-strong crowd on hand at Pepper Stadium were left broken yet again.
Former Penrith junior Lachlan Coote made the clutch plays that ensured the Cowboys would record back-to back wins and walk away with their first away win in 2016.
Coote set up two tries and kicked the 74th-minute field goal that allowed the North Queensland to lead when it mattered most; the final ten minutes of the game where Penrith have been most vulnerable particularly when playing from in front, in 2016.
But coach Paul Green singled out Coote’s contribution in defence as one of the keys in securing the hard-fought two competition points on offer before admitting his fullback (ribs) could be in doubt for next week’s clash with Souths.
“Coote had a couple of big plays for us tonight particularly in defence,” coach Paul Green stated.
“He picked up a rib injury on the try saver in the far corner (on Mansour).”
“There was another one in the corner in the first half (also on Mansour) and he’s consistently been one of our better players so far this year and is going well.”
Green also confirmed the club have not given up hope on re-signing Coote, adding that the Cowboys will have the last right of reply to any offers received for the fullback.
“I’ve said all along we haven’t said no to Coote,” Green confirmed.
“He’s not a player I want to lose or move on by any stretch.”
“At some point you can’t fit everyone in but hopefully that’s not going to be the case with Coote.”
In a high quality game, it was arguably Penrith’s best performance of the season yet had nothing to show for it, despite recording their best completion rate and making made their fewest number of errors and missed tackles.
But while Griffin praised his team for their effort, he lamented how lapses in concentration in defence at the back end of both halves proved critical as the close losses late in games continue to mount.
“I thought we played with a lot of purpose and energy,” Griffin said.
“We’ve got a young group of players playing for each other at the moment.”
“(But) we had a couple of key defensive lapses in us late in both halves and we paid the penalty for that again against a really good side.”
“We’ve got a couple of rookies defending on the right hand side there that got found out in the first half and we just loosened up on Granville at the back end of the second half at times.”
“It’s frustrating and it hurts but if we were getting beat 40 nil it would hurt more.”
“We went within ten minutes of beating the two grand final teams from last year in the last month.”
“We (have just) played the premiers, who’ve kept their team together for three or four years now and they’ve just shown their class in being able to wriggle out of our defensive pressure.”
Despite the decision to drop Tyrone Peachey in favour of a freshened up Suaia Matagi, Penrith dominating the opening exchanges to lead 10 nil with last week’s match-winner, Bryce Cartwright instrumental in both tries scored by Dallin Watene-Zelezniak.
The first try which ranks as one of the tries of the year to date, came in the eighth minute when a Coote grubber rebounded off Cartwright, who regathered first and put Te Maire Martin into open space before interchanging passes with the Kiwi winger, who finished off the spectacular 90m-movement to score in the right corner.
A quick play the ball at the Cowboys tryline in the 15th minute allowed Cartwright to go down a short blind-side providing a sublime cut-out pass to put Watene-Zelezniak, who hadn’t scored a try in 2016 going into this match with a double.
If the Panthers dominated the early exchanges, the Cowboys certainly dominated the second twenty of the first half and on the back of 57 per cent possession for the half, North Queensland led 12-10 at the break, with Coote and interchange hooker Jake Granville instrumental in both tries.
Centre Javid Bowen opened the scoring for the Cowboys in the 26th minute after Granville quickly shifted play left before Coote laid on the pass for the centre to score the first try conceded on Penrith’s outer right edge defence since Round 2.
Ten minutes later and the Cowboys were in again after Granville and Coote combined to expose Penrith’s defensive frailties on their left edge with Yeo and Soward caught out by the decoy run of Ethan Lowe that opened up the overlap for Justin O’Neill to score.
But an unusually sloppy and undisciplined start to the second half by the Cowboys soon allowed the Panthers to regain the lead, 16-12.
Peter Wallace, who continues to make every post a winner at hooker making 51 tackles on the night, darted out of dummy half from ten metres before putting Trent Merrin in under the posts after 55 minutes.
The Panthers extended the lead to six courtesy of a Jamie Soward penalty goal with 18 minutes remaining.
A controversial moment in the game occurred in the 63rd minute when Merrin, who had his best game yet since making the switch to Penrith. He scored a try, had 12 runs for 107 metres, a line-break, four tackle-busts, three offloads and 39 tackles. Merrin was involved in a nasty incident that saw Australian prop, Matthew Scott placed on a report for a crusher tackle.
But Scott was adamant after the game that he nothing to worry about before adding that Merrin admitted he stayed down to milk the penalty, but voiced his concerns that players are staying down in such situations to draw a penalty.
“I’m not too worried about it,” the Cowboys co-captain said.
“Trent said to me at the end of the game that he milked it (for the penalty).”
“We had one I think Jason Taumalolo’s first tackle when he was placed in the same position but he gets up plays the ball and it doesn’t get looked at.”
“The opposition wants two points or get the penalty so they stay down in and it gets looked at.”
As often has been the case in 2016, the Panthers were made to pay for their inability to put the game out of Cowboys reach.
A scoot out of dummy half near the line by Granville found Gavin Cooper in support and the former Panther reached out to score despite the attention of three Penrith defenders and Thurston’s conversion levelled the scores with 14 minutes remaining.
Once again the game was on the line going into the final ten minutes and it was the Cowboys big men – Scott, Taumalolo and Tamou – that allowed the defending premiers to snatch the lead courtesy of Coote’s field goal with seven minutes remaining.
Penrith had their chances to win or at least level the scores in the closing minutes but to no avail.
With three minutes remaining, Soward feigned to go for the field goal before sending play left before Mansour was bundled into touch just metres from the line.
Then with two minutes remaining Soward launched a 45 metre speculator from out wide that had it remained a foot straighter, would have sent the game into golden point.
Griffin defended Soward’s decision not to take the easier field goal attempt in the closing minutes but conceded that while his side took some wrong options in attack during the second half, his young team will be able to defend such errors when they mature.
“They were going to charge him (Soward) down so he run the ball and we needed to score,” Griffin explained.
“And if Soward’s field goal had gone a foot straighter we’re going to golden point.”
“There was a couple of wrong decisions (in attack) that were taken but when we’re
mature enough we’ll be able to defend those.”
The Cowboys then put the game beyond doubt with a try in the last play of the game to Kyle Feldt that again exposed Penrith’s left edge defence, which didn’t please skipper Matt Moylan.
“We definitely didn’t finish the way we would have liked especially with that soft try right near the end,” Moylan said.
“It’s not something that we’re about.”
“We want to finish off our games strong and that wasn’t the case tonight.”
NORTH QUEENSLAND 23 (J Bowen, J O’Neill, G Cooper, K Feldt tries J Thurston 3 goals, L Coote field goal) beat PENRITH 18 (D Watene-Zelezniak 2, T Merrin tries, J Soward 3 goals) at Pepper Stadium. Referee: Ashley Klein, Adam Gee. Crowd: 13,725. Halftime: North Queensland 12-10. Goals: Johnathan Thurston (North Queensland) 3 from 4, Jamie Soward (Penrith) 3 from 4.
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