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Interesting line up

Munster must be fit
NAS obviously out
Sua named on an extended bench
Blore & Bradley miss the 17 behind Chan and Lewis
King back to the front row
Trent starting in the middle at 13

Panthers team


1. Dylan Edwards
2. Sunia Turuva
3. Izack Tago
4. Taylan May
5. Brian To’o
6. Jarome Luai
7. Nathan Cleary (c)
8. Moses Leota
9. Luke Sommerton
10. James Fisher-Harris
11. Luke Garner
12. Liam Martin
13. Isaah Yeo

14. Tyrone Peachey
15. Lindsay Smith
16. Liam Henry
17. Matt Eisenhuth

18. Daine Laurie
19. Soni Luke
20. Brad Schneider
21. Preston Riki
22. Mavrik Geyer

Chris Lewis being named in the 17 is pretty random.

Jack Howarth still for whatever reason not being picked in the squad let alone team is such a massive disappointment.

Agree, as much as I think Lewis is a good honest toiler, to pick him ahead of Howarth, Bradley or Blore is intriguing.

Bench looks a bit light now without NAS and Blore coming on to keep us rolling, and Panthers do it better than anyone, hopefully won’t backfire on Bellyache.

Yeah Lewis couldn't get a game last year except for the last round when we played everyone bar Bellamy himself and he's in the team round 1? I'm confused.

Every year Bellamy names a bench like this Rd1 then changes it 1 hr before kick off. Never ever been 1-17 rd1. This wk won’t change. Do we think Munster will play?

Tepai Moeroa is still with us, right?

Yeah what’s the go with Tepai? Haven’t seen him named anywhere, must be injured?

Looking at the East’s/Falcons line ups there’s some interesting bits

- Howarth after a strong pre season including making the All stars game still doesn’t seem to be up to grade for Bellamy.

- Alec Mac has been named to start at lock for East’s, maybe they know he won’t make the bench for the NRL and one of Blore/Fa’alogo are in line to replace him on the pine.

- Sad to see Lazarus not make the top squad, he is on the bench for SC and to be honest I thought I saw enough from him to be pushing for 1st grade.

- Pretty much all of our young guys will be on show in this one game, I’m almost as excited to catch this as I am the NRL boys haha.

- Excited to see more of Treigh Stewart.

- Good to see our old pal Brenko Lee running around again too, always liked him when many others didn’t.

Munster out according to Foxsports. Replacement will be either Wishart or Pezet

Whilst Cam is always going to be a big loss I don’t hate it in this situation, if he limped in at 80% with no match fitness, no trials under his belt and hesitant on a dodgy groin he would be more a hinderance than a help.

Happy to see Pez get his shot, he has been playing very well in pre season and looks ready to make that next step up, and I say this with the upmost respect for Munny but Pez actually ticks a few boxes that Cam hasn’t been lately.

Will ruffle a few feathers but one could argue Pez is a better front line defender both in contact, tackle efficiency and positioning, Munster was awful last season and missed 7 or 8 tackles every game, I also like Pez big boot, he can kick us into position better than Cam, he also has a more controlled short kick, he is quicker off the mark (look at the heads up try in Fiji).

Of course Munster is a loss and on his day when he flicks that switch is unplayable, but that switch has not been flicked much lately, besides Origin and a few meaningless games he was pretty bad by his standards most of 2023.

I’m excited not only to see Pez get his shot, but hopefully it sparks Munster back to life with his spot never really challenged in his time here, if Jonah kills it against the Panthers, competition for spots always brings out the best in players

Be interesting to see if Blore comes in or not and if it's for Lewis or Mac. No offense to him at all but I still can't understand why we've kept Lewis around.

Huge pressure on the forward pack and the tweaks that have been made to the starting 13 tonight. Too early for the season to be on the line but it'll be disappointing if we get smoked again.

I really hope MacDonald plays, he just makes good things happen

I actually think we can win this. Our fowards lack mass but are shit more mobile than last year. I don't think it will be the slaughter that we experienced last year.

Canberra showed last night what some grit and hunger in defence can do, we need to adopt the same mentality tonight, grind it out or we will get whooped again. We may only get a few tries, need to try and keep Penrith to under 12 points to be any chance I think.

Ennis was banging on about how good the Panthers are but is picking us to win tonight. I hope we get a close to full house tonight! Looks like we're going to have to beat the Panthers and the ref (Sutton) tonight. I have full faith in the side that we'll get the job done tonight. Let's go!!