“Quite romantic” was Ivan Cleary’s wry description of the NRL’s round one scheduling.

Back to Brisbane, where the final scene of Penrith’s first season without a premiership since 2020 played out. No need for revenge.

And as Cleary noted at the start of the week – again with half a smirk – “you can’t take the [premiership] rings off them; they earned them.”

The last time Penrith were at Suncorp Stadium, they blinked with their season on the line: a 14-0 half-time lead in their keeping; a near-perfect first 40 minutes with 57 per cent of possession.

Not exactly butchered, because the Broncos defended like demons in one of the modern era’s epic preliminary finals, and well and truly won a classic contest. The Panthers didn’t beat themselves.

However, for the first time since the start of their all-conquering dynasty, they did cough up a 12-point lead without recovering it.

There’s been no popcorn and group therapy rewatch of September’s 16-14 loss to the eventual premiers. But the key moments where Penrith failed to put Brisbane away have loomed large all the same this summer.

“We’ve had enough time to digest where we went wrong and where we missed the mark,” fullback Dylan Edwards said.

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