25 in 25: Best finals upsets of NRL era - Which playoff boilover was the biggest surprise?

The 25th season of the NRL is done and dusted so to commemorate the first quarter-century of this instalment of the premiership, The Roar is looking back at the 25 best players and moments in 25 categories.

We are down to the penultimate topic after we have already gone through  best  fullbacks, wingers, centres, five-eighths, locks, second-rowers, players to never make Origin, coaches, captains, halfbacks, hookers, front-rowers, goal-kickers, recruits, heaviest hitters, rookies, Kiwis, Kangaroos, British imports, fights, Origin reps and Grand Final moments of the era.

Now we’re casting our minds back to the biggest finals upsets.

There have been many occasions where the lower-ranked team or the one that was widely written off before the match has turned the tables under the finals spotlight.

Jarryd Hayne motions to the Dragons fans after scoring during the 2009 qualifying final. (Photo by Mark Nolan/Getty Images)

The bookmakers aren’t always right.

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The top 10 – the best of the best

1 Warriors 18 Storm 15 in 2008 qualifying final
2 Eels 25 Dragons 12 in 2009 qualifying final
3 Wests Tigers 20 Dragons 10 in 2005 prelim final
4 Knights 30 Eels 24 in 2001 grand final 
5 Cowboys 29 Eels 0 in 2005 prelim final 
6 Panthers 18 Roosters 6 in 2003 grand final
7 Bulldogs 32 Eels 20 in 1998 prelim final
8 Storm 20 Dragons 18 in 1999 grand final 
9 Warriors 20 Storm 12 in 2011 prelim final
10 Cowboys 29 Roosters 16 in 2017 prelim final

Who can forget Michael Witt’s amazing last-ditch try for the Warriors to become the first eighth-ranked team to knock off the minor premiers in 2008, in Melbourne no less. Witt backed up a Manu Vatuvei break, inexplicably raised the ball in triumph before putting it down and nearly had it kicked out of his hands before he planted it to give Ivan Cleary his first playoff win as a coach.

Michael Witt is congratulated after scoring the winning try in 2008 in Melbourne. (Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

The Eels snuck into the 2009 playoffs but were not expected to be much of a match-up for Wayne Bennett’s table-topping St George Illawarra machine but they dominated the Dragons at Kogarah before the result was sealed with a Luke Burt long-range field goal and the exclamation mark was added when Jarryd Hayne brushed past half the opposition team to score one of the finest individual tries in premiership history.

Going into the grand final qualifiers in 2005, the stage was set for the star-studded St George Illawarra side to make the decider but Tim Sheens’ young Tigers had other ideas and with Scott Prince and Benji Marshall calling the shots, outplayed their more-fancied opponents in every aspect of play.

The 2001 premiership decider was supposed to be the crowning moment of a record-breaking year for minor premiers Parramatta and the end of the Eels’ title drought. Andrew Johns and his Newcastle Knights blitzed the favourites with four unanswered tries in the first half on the way to a six-point final victory margin which flattered the shellshocked Eels.

After the Dragons were bamboozled by the Tigers in 2005, the Eels were next to stumble at the prelim final hurdle when they were blown away the following day by North Queensland, who surged into their first grand final with Johnathan Thurston and Matt Bowen running riot out wide.

Penrith actually finished higher than the Roosters on the 2003 ladder but barely anyone gave John Lang’s team a chance in the grand final against the premiers. Panthers hooker Luke Priddis played the game of his life and Scott Sattler produced the most-replayed cover tackle in NRL history as the Panthers triumphed on a rainy night at Homebush.

The 1998 preliminary final was not only a raging upset from the team that finished ninth over fourth-placed Parramatta, it was one of the most remarkable comebacks after the Dogs trailed by 16 heading into the final 10 minutes. Daryl Halligan’s sideline conversions are rightly remembered as significant but the catalyst for the incredible victory in extra time was a two-try (and field goal) performance from halfback Craig Polla-Mounter.

Melbourne had a strong team, had finished higher on the ladder than St George Illawarra but were underdogs in the 1999 grand final in just their second season in the big league after being flogged by the Dragons earlier in the playoffs. In a script out of Hollywood, they came back from 18-2 down to seal the win with a dramatic penalty try in the dying stages.

Storm skipper Glenn Lazarus with the NRL trophy in 1999. (Stuart Milligan / Allsport)

Three years after Michael Witt’s epic finish, the Warriors conquered the Storm in Melbourne again when rookie halfback Shaun Johnson’s attacking brilliance conjured up an upset for the ages to propel the visitors into their second ever grand final.

The Roosters talked up a big game before the 2017 preliminary final against the Cowboys who were making an unlikely charge from eighth spot but despite Johnathan Thurston and Matt Scott being out injured, Michael Morgan and Jason Taumalolo stepped up to inspire the Cowboys to a lopsided win.

Best of the rest – kind of a big deal

11 Cowboys 30 Bulldogs 22 in 2004 qualifying final
12 Warriors 48 Bulldogs 22 in 2003 qualifying final
13 Raiders 12 Storm 10 in 2019 qualifying final
14 Panthers 19 Roosters 18 in 2014 qualifying final
15 Knights 18 Storm 16 in 2013 semi-final 
16 Rabbitohs 16 Panthers 10 in 2021 qualifying final
17 Warriors 30 Roosters 13 in 2008 semi-final 
18 Bulldogs 28 Knights 16 in 1998 elimination prelim final 
19 Cowboys 10 Broncs 0 in 2004 semi-final
20 Storm 31 Broncos 14 in 2004 qualifying final

Canterbury entered the 2004 playoffs primed to win the premiership after a couple of seasons of chaos. They ultimately achieved their goal but they did it the hard way after a first-up loss to North Queensland with Matt Sing’s hat-trick proving decisive.

The Dogs were slow starters the previous year when they were complacent in a 3vs5 match-up with the Warriors and were flogged 48-22 at Sydney Showground with winger Francis Meli, becoming the second player in premiership history to achieve the feat after Canterbury’s Edgar Newham in 1942.

The Raiders were on a roll in 2019 late in the season and headed south to face the Storm in Melbourne and in a cracking match, toppled the minor premiers on the back of a rousing try to English second-rower John Bateman. 

John Bateman. (Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

Penrith in 2014 were rebuilding, the Roosters were the defending premiers. But the Panthers opened their finals campaign with a stunning one-point victory via a pair of tries to Dean Whare and Jamie Soward’s last-gasp wobbly field goal.

There’s a theme emerging here of ragtag teams travelling to the Victorian capital and coming away with a win against the odds. Pretty much any win on Storm turf is an upset, particularly in the finals and that’s what Wayne Bennett’s seventh-placed Knights did a decade ago when they stretched out to a 12-4 half-time lead and hung on by two points.

The 2021 playoffs were seemingly set up for a Storm vs Panthers grand final but Souths didn’t follow that script with skipper Adam Reynolds leading the Rabbitohs to a six-point winning margin at Townsville in the COVID-affected season when all matches were relocated to Queensland. 

(Photo by Ian Hitchcock/Getty Images)

In 2008 after their taking down the Storm in week one, the Warriors backed it up to thrash the Roosters by 17 in a rare post-season fixture in Auckland, with Lance Hohaia starring as they eliminated their fourth-placed opponents.

It was nine vs two when the Bulldogs lined up against Andrew Johns and the Knights in a 1998 elimination final. Everyone was expecting ARL champions Newcastle to progress to a showdown with rebel Super League kings Brisbane but Canterbury bashed them through the middle in relentless fashion.

The 2004 finals were full of upsets – North Queensland’s 10-point shut-out of Brisbane was the club’s first victory over their big cousins, which came a week after the Storm marched into Brisbane and put on 31 points in the second half to win by 17.

The final five – strange days indeed

21 Dragons 23 Bulldogs 22 in 2001 qualifying final
22 Sharks 52 Bulldogs 10 in 2001 semi-final
23 Raiders 28 Storm 20 in 2022 qualifying final
24 Bulldogs 18 Sea Eagles 17 in 2014 semi-final
25 Dragons 24 Sharks 8 in 1999 prelim final

The 2001 series also had a couple of turn-ups for the books – the seventh-ranked Dragons getting home via a Willie Peters field goal over the second-ranked Dogs and the following week, Cronulla – who had finished the regular season fourth – sent Canterbury packing with a 52-10 flogging at the old SFS. 

Last year’s finals series mostly went to script apart from Canberra continuing their habit of getting under the Storm’s skin to eliminate Craig Bellamy’s boys in week one. 

Canterbury in 2014 brought down the curtain on Manly’s run of seven straight finals series when Trent Hodkinson out-duelled Daly Cherry-Evans in a field goal shoot-out. 

And the 1999 prelim final when St George Illawarra scored 24 unanswered points in the second half was technically an upset as Cronulla were the minor premiers but when you compare the big names on the two squads, it’s no surprise in hindsight that Anthony Mundine and Nathan Blacklock ran amok.

Just missed the cut – most peculiar, mama

The seventh-placed Eels downing the second-placed Roosters 32-8 in the first week of the 2000 finals was a decent upset, as was St George Illawarra’s 26-22 triumph over the Knights two years later in a qualifying final at the SFS.

The Broncos got the better of the minor premiership-winning St George Illawarra side 24-10 in 2009 but that match was played at Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium in front of a parochial crowd of more than 50,000 fans.