Sunday afternoon thriller a Grand Final preview

Penrith has been outstanding, Canterbury and Parramatta have shown good signs and bad, while Newcastle is the surprise packet after two stirring upsets.

Issac Luke celebrates icing the game for the Rabbitohs. Photo: Getty

But it will take a special performance to prevent the dream Grand Final showdown we’ve been denied in the last two seasons – a South Sydney and Sydney Roosters grudge match – taking place on the first Sunday in October.

• Brett Stewart sets Brookvale try record 
• Shark attack: Carney wins unfair dismissal case 
• Bennett slams NRL player movement rules

The Rabbitohs and Roosters produced an early-season classic at ANZ Stadium, belying the usual rustiness and fatigue common in March with an encounter of September quality and intensity. The premiers of the last two seasons have both overcome major off-season departures to hit the ground running in 2015.

Souths have more reasons than most defending champs to fail to break the vaunted ‘premiers curse’ and go back-to-back: the loss of their two most senior forwards, centre sensation Kirisome Auva’a’s nine-month suspension, the Arizona arrest debacle and a captaincy change. But they’ve ticked every box to date.

On the ropes on a couple of occasions against the Roosters – the first time since last year’s Grand Final the Rabbitohs have been tested – their composure and game-breaking class in fighting back to win 34-26 were hallmarks of the great club sides.

On the other side of the inner-Sydney fence, the Roosters will be bitterly disappointed to have let a match slip that they appeared to have in their keeping at 22-12 and 26-18. But, particularly after dismantling the Cowboys on the road in Round 1, the positives are far outweighing the negatives.

A leadership void in an overwhelmingly young squad was a pre-season concern of those outside the club, but – in a quality that has been matched by some of their youthful Rabbitohs counterparts – the Roosters’ stars are stepping into the breach left by Anthony Minichiello and Sonny Bill Williams.

The competition’s fiercest rivals have not squared off in a premiership decider since 1935 but on the evidence provided so far, that drought is on the verge of ending.

Has the Cowboys’ premiership window closed?

Pundits were clamouring to declare 2015 the year North Queensland shed three seasons of finals anguish and surged to its maiden title. Two weeks into their widely predicted watershed season, the Cowboys are 0-2 after a pair of dismal home losses to the Roosters and Newcastle.

The continuity of the Cowboys’ line-up was pointed to as one of their greatest assets but the opening fortnight of the competition has highlighted some glaring deficiencies on the team sheet.

Their three-quarter line appears distinctly unthreatening, they lack punch and presence at dummy-half and their forward pack has been clearly outpointed in the intimidation stakes.

It’s been 11 years since JT’s last premiership. Can he win another? Photo: Getty

A side that boasts the game’s greatest playmaker in Johnathan Thurston and the NRL’s most damaging forward, Jason Taumololo, has produced just three line-breaks.

Given their well-documented travel woes, the Cowboys already have plenty of ground to make up after dropping four points at their usually impregnable Townsville fortress – and it’s already shaping as a long road back.

Ref controversy embargo lasts one week

Maybe ditching the pink shirts subliminally pacified us, but the referees were conspicuous by their lack of controversy and head-scratching calls in a series of Round 1 performances to be applauded.

The honeymoon is well and truly over.

The contentious referral system – which dictates the on-field officials must call try or no-try before sending it to the video ref – was badly exposed in Bathurst, thwarting the Titans on two occasions when the man in the box didn’t have the bottle to overrule the original call despite having every reason to.

But it paled in comparison to the dog’s breakfast of a performance the refereeing crew dished up at Brookvale Oval.

Inexplicably failing to refer what appeared to be a fair try to Melbourne winger Young Tonumaipea, Manly compounded the outrage when Brett Stewart crossed a minute later. (The commentators didn’t pick it up at the time, but freeze-frame that replay – I’m not convinced Stewart forced the ball, either.)

The call to deny Storm forward Tim Glasby a crucial try for an alleged double-movement was diabolical in another example of a video ref second-guessing common sense because of the on-field official’s compulsory, potentially unsighted, heat-of-the-moment call.