Adam Reynolds has doubled down on Brisbane’s belief that their season can still be rescued, saying earlier this week the Broncos remain confident they can turn their worrying form slump around. That message landed in Round 15, with the defending premiers just over halfway through the regular season and already staring at a run of opponents that could define their year.
The timing matters because Brisbane do not have room to drift. They have two byes in the next five weeks, but after this week they face the Roosters, Sharks, Panthers, Cowboys, Knights, Dolphins and Warriors, and every one of those teams has won at least seven games this season. For a club trying to steady itself after a poor patch, that is not a soft landing. It is a test.
Reynolds’ confidence stands in sharp contrast to the verdict from Paul Crawley, who said the Broncos were heading towards one of the biggest disasters for a reigning premier in 20 years. Crawley said the team is already gone, and pointed to the fact that the Broncos became the first defending premier since the Bulldogs in 2005 to lose to the last and second-last teams on the ladder in consecutive weeks. He also noted that the Bulldogs were the last grand-final winning team to drop six straight games in the following season, a warning sign that frames Brisbane’s slide in ugly historical terms.
The comparison does not stop there. Crawley said the Tigers were the most recent reigning premiers to miss the finals before Brisbane, excluding Melbourne in 2010, with Wests missing out in 2006 after winning the competition in 2005. His view was blunt: even if Brisbane sneak into the finals, they cannot afford to lose one more game if they want to finish in the top four, and he said the club has already let itself down badly in recent weeks.
That is the tension around Brisbane now. Reynolds is asking for belief, and the schedule is asking a harsher question: can confidence survive another seven weeks against opposition that has already proven it can win, or does this become the season a reigning premier slips from titleholder to cautionary tale?
