Statistics that explain why the Panthers fell from their throne: ‘It’s tough with new combinations’

Time is running out for Penrith to re-establish their status as the NRL’s best defensive team this season, with the three-time champions themselves admitting they are conceding too many points.

Since 2020, Ivan Cleary’s Panthers have leveraged a watertight defence to a level of premiership success unprecedented in the NRL era.

The 286 points they conceded in the 2021 regular season were the fewest any team conceded under a salary cap in a 24-round campaign following the Super League war.

The Panthers have also been the best defensive team over the past two years, both of which finished in the premiership, leading up to the 2020 campaign.

But under former Penrith assistant coach Cameron Ciraldo, Canterbury have conceded 15 points less than the Panthers with two rounds to play in the regular season.

The Panthers trail only the Bulldogs in that stat, but they have conceded more than 20 points in nine games this season, which is the same number of points conceded in the past two campaigns.

Penrith are currently on a three-game streak of losing games by more than 20 points for the first time since 2019.

“We’ve probably conceded a lot more points this year than we would have liked to have throughout the season,” prop Lindsay Smith said.

“We have the will and the right systems in place, it’s now just a matter of getting back to football.”

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Penrith’s constant changes to the line-up haven’t helped.

Smith is the only Panthers player to have featured in every game this season, with Nathan Cleary, Dylan Edwards, James Fisher-Harris and Scott Sorensen among those missing out through injury.

Edwards, Liam Martin, Isaah Yeo, Brian To’o and Jerome Luai have also missed time due to State of Origin duty, although that’s not a new problem at Penrith.

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That change will continue against South Sydney this Friday, when Paul Alamoti returns from injury to play centre and Sunia Turuva is recalled to the wing.

“It’s tough with the new combinations, but that’s no excuse,” center Izaac Tagoe said.

“There have been bigger scorelines. It’s definitely a matter of working on the defence,” he said.

“It’s still something we’re proud of and we try to improve it.”

The Panthers missed all four of their attempts against Canberra last week and are now determined to put that right in the fortnight before the finals.

“We’re definitely losing more points than we expected,” sophomore Luke Garner said.

“We’ll continue to work hard on it this week and hopefully we can hold the Rabbitohs to nil on Friday.”

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