The Broncos have never needed a messiah because up until recently they’d never needed one.
For the first 32 years of their existence, the finals were expected and for the most part, the team delivered – 27 times in the playoffs, never finishing lower than 12th with six trophies filling the bulging Red Hill cabinet.
After the disaster of the 2020 wooden spoon and last year’s marginal improvement under Kevin Walters to 14th, Adam Reynolds became the most important import brought to Brisbane.
For the glamour club of the NRL, the Queensland flagship with maroon dyed in the wool, paying top dollar to lure a halfback north of the border became a necessity. They couldn’t give afford to give a XXXX about the tradition of being the place where only the best Queensland talent resides.
They needed rescuing and Reynolds gives them a leader, an on-field general, a goal-kicker and a genuine chance to make the finals. They have talent on their roster but without a focal point to get the best out of Payne Haas, Jordan Riki, Selwyn Cobbo, Kotoni Staggs and Patrick Carrigan, the Broncos will remain mired in mediocrity.
Reynolds, who will make his Broncos debut against the Bulldogs on Sunday at Homebush, fronted the media on Thursday and couldn’t have looked more relaxed after the team upset his old club South Sydney last week while he was sidelined with COVID-19.
He’s declared Brisbane’s campaign will be a failure if they don’t at least make the finals and when badgered about the topic, the 31-year-old batted the questions away with glorious league-speak cliches about there being no worries about pressure and expectation as long as he and his teammates turn up and do their job in this pretty simple game they play.
Brisbane’s 2022 marquee recruits Kurt Capewell and Adam Reynolds (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)
Broncos great Corey Parker has not seen such a groundswell of hype in Brisbane about a recruit. The club has primarily relied on the cream of the home-grown crop since 1988, very occasionally bringing in an import from NSW in such a key role as halfback with only Peter Wallace, who played six seasons from 2008-13 the only significant name from south of the border to have worn the No.7 jersey.
“I can’t remember an individual in recent times having more pressure on him than Adam Reynolds. The talk and the hype around him over the summer has been enormous and rightly so,” Parker said.
“He hasn’t played a trial game, he’s the skipper of the club, the big off-season signing and everyone wants to see him in Broncos colours and see how he goes. That’s intriguing to think how that’ll unfold.
“He’s said anything less than finals is a failure so there’s high expectations he’s put on the team, which I like. He will have a few nerves, it’ll be strange for him to run out in Broncos colours after wearing red and green for his whole career.
(Photo by Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images)
“He hasn’t had a trial game, without doubt he’s underdone.”
Walters put aside any family connections to brush his son Billy for Albert Kelly as Reynolds’ halves partner in Round 2 after both players shone in the 11-4 upset over the Bunnies.
Reynolds didn’t give much away when asked about his preference as his halves partner, saying Kelly and Walters each “performed really well last week”.
He is expecting “nothing crazy” from Kelly against the Dogs, just to do his role and back his instincts.
Parker believes Kelly is the Broncos’ best option in trying to replicate a scrum-base comrade for Reynolds like his long-time ally at Souths, Cody Walker.
“I think they complement each other very well in their style of play. Going from the tone of Adam when he’s spoken about his halves partner over the summer I’ve always felt he was going to lean more towards Albert Kelly. He’s defensively a bigger body, he’s played in the NRL and overseas for a long time and he plays a style of footy similar to Cody Walker. A little bit off the cuff,” he said.
“While Kelly doesn’t have a great kicking game, that’s what Reyno is there for. He’s got the instinctive game that Reyno doesn’t. It should be interesting to see how it all unfolds.”
Brisbane have a golden chance to make it back-to-back wins against the wooden spooners but Parker said fans should be wary of a false dawn until the team proves its credentials on a more regular basis.
“Over recent years teams that the Broncos are supposed to beat, they haven’t done so,” he said.
“Putting that aside the performance against Souths was exactly what it needed to be. They had a willingness to compete, they wanted to put in for each other, protect each other. Were they great? No they weren’t. There’s a lot they can improve on.
“I’m sure they’ll be wanting to build on the performance against the Rabbitohs but we’ll wait and see. It’s certainly a step in the right direction but they need to back it up.
“The Bulldogs had a gritty win last weekend but they won only three games last year. Three games. They’ve started 2022 with seven or eight recruits and a win under their belt. They’ve got Tevita Pangai jnr coming back this weekend so they’ve got a lot of emotion and feeling with what they’re doing too. They’re gonna turn up ready for a contest so it should be a really good Sunday afternoon game.”
(Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images)
Pangai had a chequered pre-season trial against Cronulla in which he was lucky to escape suspension for a couple of spiteful incidents before sitting out last Sunday’s 6-4 road triumph over the Cowboys with a hamstring strain.
Canterbury coach Trent Barrett was confident Pangai, who would be coming up against his old team Brisbane for the first time since his exit late last season, would not let his emotions get the better of him.
“It’s certainly not about Tevita, we need the whole team to play well. Tevita has had his mind taken off who we’re playing by just getting himself right for the game. That’s probably his main focus,” he said.
“We want him to be aggressive, that’s in his nature but there’s a fine line there as well, he understands that. He’s looking forward to playing, he’s had a disrupted pre-season.”
The Dogs were accused of breaking the NRL’s concussion rules last week when hooker Jeremy Marshall-King was replaced late in the game despite seeming to have a shoulder injury rather than a head knock but Barrett rejected any claims they had circumvented the protocols.
“It was difficult on the weekend because we had five of them and there’s independent doctors now that rule that for you. We followed all the protocols directly to the letter from our end but it did make the interchanges quite challenging at times,” he said.
“We are happy with the way we handled it and did everything right.”
Sunday’s game will be Canterbury’s first home game in Sydney since their 66-0 humiliation at the hands of Manly last July.
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NRL signings, contracts and rosters for the 2024 season and beyond.
