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Newcastle showed they will not take a backward step no matter who they’re up against in 2023 while Penrith proved that they are back-to-back premiers for a reason after outlasting the gallant Knights 16-15 at McDonald Jones Stadium on Saturday night.
Penrith were hustled and bustled by the home side for the majority of the match and did not get a moment’s peace until Nathan Cleary sunk the Knights with a beautifully struck field goal in the first minute of extra time to live up to his iceman reputation.
“What a champion, with ice in his veins, delivers and gets Penrith an incredible win here in Newcastle,” Fox League’s Michael Ennis boomed as he watched the instant replay of Cleary’s dagger.
Fellow premiership winner added Cooper Cronk: “You can do nothing but pay your respects and tip your hat to Nathan Cleary. That’s not luck, that is class, that is precision, that is a calm head in difficult times and that’s tremendous.”
Daniel Saifiti. (Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images)
After Penrith opened the scoring with a penalty goal, the Knights drew first blood when Tyson Gamble touched down in the 11th minute.
The Knights made it 8-2 when Tyson Frizell made it across the stripe before Panthers winger Brian To’o cut the margin to two when the visitors took advantage of Dane Gagai giving away a penalty while in possession for giving the referee a spray.
Makeshift hooker Phoenix Crossland grubbered for himself in the 27th minute from close range to give the hosts what turned out to be a 14-6 lead at the break.
Penrith dodged a bullet late in the opening stanza when referee Peter Gough marched Spencer Leniu to the sin bin for taking Gamble out as he tried to chase a kick but after a captain’s challenge, the replay showed Scott Sorensen had accidentally collided with the Newcastle playmaker and Leniu remained on the field.
In a mark of respect for Newcastle’s defence, the Panthers elected to narrowed the gap with a penalty goal in the 54th minute before Jaeman Salmon equalised when he surged onto an inside pass from Nathan Cleary.
They had entered Newcastle’s red zone after Frizell was perhaps unluckily penalised for pulling Jarome Luai’s hair as he grabbed the Penrith pivot’s collar as he threatened to make a break.
Lachie Miller had the chance to break the 14-14 deadlock in the 71st minute after Penrith were penalised for impeding Dominic Young on a kick-chase but just like he did in the recent draw with Manly, he sprayed the go-ahead goal.
Gamble revived memories of Braith Anasta’s famous long-range playoff field goal for the Roosters against the Wests Tigers when he knocked over a deep one-pointer with four minutes left after Jackson Hastings was blocked and flung the ball wide to his halves partner.
Cleary coolly levelled the scores with a field goal two minutes later and was hit late by Lachlan Fitzgibbon after the Panthers star had booted his field goal, leading to a mild melee between several players. But no penalty was awarded after the bunker ruled the contact was not high or forceful.
It didn’t matter in the end when Cleary made no mistake with his first chance at a field goal in extra time to break Newcastle’s hearts.
His dad, Penrith coach Ivan Cleary, clearly didn’t agree with the call but didn’t want to blast the officials.
“We’ve all got views but we don’t want to turn (them) into a headline. We’re happy to get the win and move on,” he said.
“I don’t want to be disrespectful to the Knights but it probably is (our worst performance). But having said that, we haven’t really played badly in the games we’ve lost. We didn’t start well and they did. They certainly put us under pressure.
“We just sort of kept plugging away, that’s what I’m obviously most happy with, just the fact that we kept on coming and in the end just got there.”
Frizell was rightly miffed about his controversial penalty for grabbing Luai’s hair when he insisted it was an accident.
“When his hair’s hanging halfway down his back and I’m going to make a tackle, it’s incidental, I guess, if I do pull his hair,” Frizell said.
“It’s classified as a penalty but it wasn’t intentional. I’d like for him to tie his hair up.”
Knights coach Adam O’Brien thought his team copped the raw end of that deal.
“It’s ridiculous,” he said. “Otherwise I’ll advise them all to start growing their hair long to try and get an advantage.
“I think players get a bit of credit, they are actually just trying to make tackles and get people on the ground, take them to the ground.
“I guess there must be a lot of innuendo that players out there to maim each other and pull hair … it’s not the case.”
The Knights were uncharacteristically soft more often than not last season but in 2023 they have rediscovered the mettle that made the Steel City famous in previous decades.
They went into this game without both their co-captains – Jayden Brailey unfortunately won’t play again this year after tearing his ACL last week while Kalyn Ponga is fortunately set to make his return next week after recovering from his latest concussion-related stint on the sidelines.
Faced with the prospect of taking on the premiers, the Knights didn’t overplay their hand with anything too fancy but muscled up to the challenge in true Newcastle style.
When they opened their season with a loss to the Warriors, a narrow victory over the Wests Tigers and a home defeat to the Dolphins, there were fears that the Knights could end up in the cellar.
But they have revived their season with a triumph over Canberra, a high-scoring draw with Manly and a revenge mission against the Warriors to show they won’t be easybeats.
And even though they lost this match, they lost no admirers for their effort in taking the NRL’s benchmark team to the wire.
“You can see that there’s a group in there that’s really, really disappointed,” O’Brien said. “They put a hell of a lot of effort in, especially defensively.
“We’ve just been gradually improving in little areas. We don’t want to let this loss or the disappointment derail that improvement.”
Penrith have been fixtures at the top of the ladder over the past three seasons as they have qualified for three straight grand finals, winning the past two.
They were minor premiers in 2020, beaten out on for and against by Melbourne the following year and were runaway competition leaders last season.
Penrith could very well end up high on the ladder again this season – after moving alongside Brisbane and the Warriors on 10 competition points at the top – but it shouldn’t be a priority.
They are getting every team’s best shot each week, they should be used to that by now, as they try to become the first team since Parramatta three decades ago to complete a premiership threepeat.
Newcastle gave them all they could throw at them for 80 minutes straight and the Panthers were forced to pull out all the stops in front of the sell-out McDonald Jones Stadium crowd.
They just need to get into the top four at season’s end and if they’re healthy, they will again be the team to beat in the finals.
One sour note for the Panthers was Kangaroos second-rower Liam Martin twinging his hamstring in his return after a month on the sidelines.
With a month left before Origin teams are selected, his place in the NSW squad could be under a cloud if scans reveal a tear.