Sunday 28th June at Leichhardt Oval
Penrith 35 – Tries: Simmons (4), Mansour (1), Wallace (1), Watene-Zelezniak (1); Goals: Soward (2), Simmons (1); Field goals: Wallace (1) | Wests Tigers 12
More: themightypanthers.com/match1142.htm
The Tigers opened the scoring in the 15th minute to lead 6-0.
Nine minutes later a well-timed Dean Whare flick pass hit winger David Simmons who broke the line down the right flank and Peter Wallace’s support on his inside was rewarded with a try under the uprights – Jamie Soward’s conversion locked it up at 6-all.
Taking advantage of a 40-20 kick minutes later a chain of passes close to the line found an unmarked Josh Mansour on the left wing and he acrobatically evaded the converging cover defence in the corner to ground the ball only centre metres from the corner post. It remained unconverted as the Panthers now led 10-4.
The Tigers struck back with just over 5 minutes remaining in the half to lead 12-10, taking the 2 point lead into half time.
With just over a minute gone after the resumption, Penrith had regained the lead when David Simmons stepped back inside and exploited a gap in the sliding defence to cross over, with Soward’s conversion making it 16-10.
In the 50th minute, Simmons was over for a double when he was once again on the end of a chain of backline passes but this time ran a straight line towards the corner.
In the 61st minute Simmons was over for a second half hat-trick when Whare busted the line, and drew in the defending fullback to find an unmarked Simmons to go over untouched, and the visitors were leading by 12.
Just before the 65 minute mark, the Panthers gained a psychological greater than 2 converted try advantage when Peter Wallace potted a field goal from about 18 metres out.
Penrith further pushed the lead out with a Dallin Watene-Zelezniak try that survived a possible obstruction infringement from the video referee, and was iced in the after the full time siren in bizarre circumstances when the Panthers threw the ball around and was intercepted by the Tigers, only to be intercepted by Lewis Brown who sliced through the scattered defensive line and found Simmons who barged over for his fourth try of the match, and added the extras to make it 35-12 at full time.
The Mighty Panthers 