Penrith coach Ivan Cleary has paid credit to the Storm for their role in "awakening a monster" as the Panthers aim for an historic four-peat in Sunday's grand final at Accor Stadium.
While Cleary has downplayed talk of presiding over a dynasty, the Panthers are gunning for a fourth straight title in their fifth straight grand final; a feat that hasn't been achieved for almost 60 years.
It's a winning run that began in 2020, when they lost to Melbourne, and Cleary revealed the influence of the Storm in Penrith's success.
“It's hard to say if it was the most important, but it definitely was an important part of our journey,” Cleary said when asked at the NRL Fan Fest media event if that game had influenced Penrith’s recent run of success.
“We had a great season that year, I think we went into the grand final having 17 wins on the trot.
“We'd had a really good run, but we were taught a lesson that day – not just by the Storm – but just about big occasions.
“We just didn't play our best out there and they were too good for us.
“So, it definitely lit a fuse, a fire … we wanted to make sure that we learnt from that.
“It was still a very young team at that point, so (we knew there were so many) good times ahead of us, that we thought anyway.
“[There have been] a lot of important milestones along the way, but that game was certainly a good one for us.”
Asked if he knew he was about to awaken ‘a monster’ following that game, Bellamy said he hadn’t “really thought of it like that”, but his side has also grown since that important win for the club.
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“I just worry about what we're doing … but obviously to win that grand final, it was a great moment for us,” Bellamy said.
“But as Ivan said, it's something that the Panthers have grown from as well.
“It was a grand final we played in; it was different times then, back in COVID.
"It was a pretty special one for us because we basically lived out of Melbourne for about four or five months, and to be able to gel together and play as well as we did under those circumstances was pretty special.”
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As the best two teams of the year, and arguably the most consistently successful in the recent NRL era, both clubs have an enviable ability to replenish their stocks to produce players who fit the needs of the team.
While both sides boast some of the brightest stars of the game, their ability to keep themselves at the top of the ladder and playing finals comes from the work of their lesser-known names to turn up and do their role each week.
Following the suspension of Nelson Asofa-Solomona, the Storm will only have three players who featured in their 2020 triumph on Sunday, while Penrith will have eight.
However, the grand final rookies playing in their first decider will know exactly what’s expected of them.
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“We haven't had a whole heap of guys play in the grand final before in this present team, but that's the way the game works these days,” Bellamy said.
“Penrith have done such a great job; five grand finals in a row, that's really unheard of in the modern era.
“I say the more success you have, the more players you seem to turn over, so you have just got to try and find that formula of the balance and when you do lose good players, trying to get good younger players back in or good consistent players from other clubs that you think that will fit into your system.
“Picking the right players, the right people to be in your club sometimes is a little bit difficult, but you always have got to back yourself and go from there.”
While the Storm have relied on developing players through their statewide affiliated clubs, the Panthers have built a strong pathway from their junior systems up, with Cleary also speaking about working towards the bigger picture when it came to his squad.
“I guess we tried to form a system that it's not so much about the individual players, it's about how they all connect together,” Cleary said.
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“The eight players that have been through this five-year period; they are great leaders and we're lucky enough to have some outstanding leaders in our club, and they can pass on the standards and what we stand for at our club to the younger players.
“We're also a development club, so we pride ourselves on bringing young players through.
“And that also goes down through the ranks that they understand what it's about to play for the Panthers and the sooner we can get that into them, the better.”
