Yesterday the NRL Grand Final was played in Sydney and not only was it an exciting and close game but it was also historic in a couple of ways. The first is that Penrith won their 3rd Premiership in a row, which is a feat not achieved for 40 years. The second is that they recorded the biggest come from behind victory in the history of NRL Grand Finals.
The match started at a frantic pace and the young talent of Brisbane looked a bit nervous. They failed to complete more than half of their possessions for the first 25 minutes or so and one particularly bad error gifted the opening try to Penrith. It was possibly the softest try you’ll ever see in a Grand Final. Penrith were dominating early to lead 8-0 before a barge-over try by Brisbane power forward Thomas Flegler just before the break saw the score 8-6 at half time.
It was not long after half time that the game took a dramatic twist. Wham, Bam, Ezra Mam snatched not one, but two brilliant individual tries before then backing up young gun Reece Walsh (who had a shocker early) to score a third try for Brisbane within the space of about 10 minutes and Brisbane raced out to a seemingly unbeatable 24-8 lead. Also around that time key Penrith play-maker Jarome Luia left the field with a busted shoulder and inspirational Penrith Lock Forward Isaah Yeo went off with a heavy head knock. The game looked like it was a forgone conclusion and Brisbane had it in the bag….
However the Penrith captain Nathan Cleary had other ideas and inspired a miraculous comeback. One huge linebreak to set up Moses Leota followed by a massive 40/20 kick that led to another Penrith try and then finishing it off with a great individual try himself to lock up the scores. A simple conversion from near the posts gave them the lead again 26-24 with just 2 minutes to go. Brisbane were gutted. The most talented team lost. The most experienced team won. That’s Rugby League in Australia.