Panthers coach Ivan Cleary doesn’t believe his side should be outright last given their performances this season, but conceded his side need to play better for longer to get back on track.
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Penrith’s 26-10 loss to the Sea Eagles was their sixth in eight rounds this season and they will be anchored to the bottom of the ladder with a clash against the Broncos in Magic Round next up.
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“I don’t think so, but I guess it is,” Cleary said when asked if his side deserve to be last.
“The ladder doesn’t really matter until July or August or something, but I guess it’s a talking point.
“When you only win two games, you’re going to be down there somewhere.”
The Panthers found themselves down 14-0, before coming back to 14-10, but two late tries to Manly sealed a disappointing result for the four time premiers.
“We just didn’t play well enough,” Cleary said.
“First half just too many errors and on the back of things like 8-1 penalty count or penalties and six agains, so that’s just far too much possession against us.
“I feel like they played well. I thought we finished the first half quite well with 12 men and we were chipping away at the score and looked like we were ahead at one stage and then we went another three sets where we couldn’t complete.
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“Then the second half became a bit of a shambles, so just starting and stopping and people getting binned and all that. We just couldn’t get it done tonight.”
Cleary was visibly frustrated with the number of penalties and sin bins in the game that he believes is not a good look for the sport.
“Yeah, absolutely and that’s just some of the things that we can control,” Cleary said of the penalties.
“We actually helped that which is not what the way we want to play and it’s not the way I don’t think we want the game as a whole to look like, but that’s just how it is.
“But there’s certainly some things in there that we contributed to which is what went into it to be concerned about mainly.”
Cleary was put on the spot with one question about the refereeing.
“Do you feel like it has been a bit of an overcorrection the way high tackles and shoulder charges and things like that are being policed at the moment?” a journalist asked.
“I think that’s probably a fair comment,” Cleary Sr said.
Despite the loss, Cleary doesn’t’ doubt he has the players in his team to turn their season around.
“I don’t think you can question the character of our team,” Cleary said.
“Thought it was on show all the way through the game, we just didn’t play well enough and that’s kind of been the story of the season.
“We thought we’d played a lot better last week, but we’re still trying to find what sort of team we are and our combinations and all that.
“Tonight was just, you have got to play well to win NRL games, especially when the opposition played well and we didn’t play well enough.”
Nathan Cleary wasn’t at his best and lamented his side’s inability to hold momentum for longer periods.
“Pretty disappointed,” Cleary Jr said.
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“Just sort of replaying the game through my head. It’s not good enough to be honest.
“I think there were definitely periods where it felt like we were gaining some momentum, but we just gave away way too easily through errors and penalties and all the rest of it.”
However, the star halfback is confident his players can turn things around on the field.
“Well, I’m still super positive about what this group can do because I feel like in every single game we’ve had patches that are like the footy we want to play,” Cleary said.
“It’s just they’re just too few and far between at the moment and it’s like we want it to be hard instead of actually going after it and making the game easier, which is a weird thing to say.
“But it’s just finding that consistency through a game when we have momentum, actually building on it rather than just giving it up.”
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Cleary senior challenged his team to learn from their defeats and play better for longer in the coming weeks.
“Yeah, absolutely, we want to play better though, that’s what we need to worry about,” Cleary said when asked if his team can defend their title.
“As Nathan said, we’ve got to put bigger periods of good play together. We’ve got to start the game better than we did tonight. When we had momentum tonight, we sort of gave it up.
“That’s not going to win you too many games, so it’s all stuff we know how to do, but it’s too many times this year so far that’s happened.
“But if I just talk about that tonight, you look back and just go, we just have got to play better. It’s not rocket science.
“But to win NRL games, you have got to play better for longer and we know how to do that.
“But unfortunately, this team, to this point, we haven’t done that, offered enough. So that’s our challenge.“
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