{"id":444694,"date":"2025-03-24T18:07:07","date_gmt":"2025-03-24T19:07:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=444694"},"modified":"2025-03-25T00:14:01","modified_gmt":"2025-03-25T00:14:01","slug":"slater-stumped-by-strange-panthers-comeback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=444694","title":{"rendered":"Slater stumped by 'strange' Panthers comeback"},"content":{"rendered":"

L\ufeffeague legend Billy Slater<\/a> found Penrith<\/a>'s resurgence against the Storm as "quite strange" after Nathan Cleary was ruled out early<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The star halfback was knocked out inside 10 minutes \ufeffand midway through the first half, Melbourne were leading 14-0 in the grand final rematch.<\/p>\n

However, the Panthers showed why they're the defending premiers, eventually leading 16-14.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Rival clubs swirl as DCE makes shock contract call<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Multi-player battle to replace sidelined Panthers superstar<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> This moment could point to huge off-field win for Swans<\/strong><\/a>\ufeff<\/p>\n

Both teams went try for try with the Storm eventually winning 30-24.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Slater \ufeffwas seriously impressed with the Panthers' ability to comeback despite losing the best player in the competition.<\/p>\n

\ufeff"I thought it was an incredibly courageous effort by the Panthers and testament to what they've done over the last five years, losing player after player in the off-season and they rejuvenate all these young western Sydney guys that come through and become mainstays," he said on Nine's The Billy Slater podcast.<\/p>\n

"And then they had to do it on the run. Nathan very rarely goes off in a game and he went off (early) and they had to adjust.<\/p>\n

"\ufeffThey had Blaize Talagi on the bench, he got injected into the halves next to another young guy in Jack Cole and I thought they really stood up.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"They actually played their best football with Nathan off the field, which I thought was quite strange\ufeff. I'm not sure if Melbourne took off the accelerator a little bit or the Panthers changed their style and put a lot more pressure on them.<\/p>\n

"Either way it was an incredible performance … it was probably the reason \ufeffwhy the team that lost was more proud of their performance than the team that won."<\/p>\n

Watch the 2025 NRL premiership live and free on Nine and<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy cut a disappointed figure post-match when he was interviewed by \ufeffNine's Cameron Smith<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Cleary<\/p>\n

His press conference was equally as sombre despite the Storm being undefeated.<\/p>\n

"I'm not happy at all," Bellamy told Nine post-match.<\/p>\n

"It was a really good start but we got a bit complacent which I don't really like that in our team.<\/p>\n

"Perhaps we could've kept going but when Nathan went off that was probably a (thought of), 'Oh, their main man is gone. This is going to be easy now'.<\/p>\n

"You don't say that to yourself but it sort of comes back.<\/p>\n

"Having said that i was really happy with the decision to take the two points.<\/p>\n

"I'm pretty disappointed to be quite honest."<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

L\ufeffeague legend Billy Slater found Penrith's resurgence against the Storm as "quite strange" after Nathan Cleary was ruled out early. The star halfback was knocked […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":444300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444694"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=444694"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":444699,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444694\/revisions\/444699"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/444300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=444694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=444694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=444694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}