Broncos feel pressure to erase Eels debacle
WAYNE Bennett has challenged Brisbane’s stars to prove they have the hunger to win the premiership as the Broncos fight to resurrect their teetering campaign against the Cowboys tonight.
The Broncos enter the Queensland derby blockbuster in Townsville under pressure to prove their title bona fides after conceding 52 points in last week’s defensive debacle against the Eels.
Bennett dismissed concerns the Broncos were faltering at the worst possible time but admitted his squad had room for improvement and must go to another level to break the club’s 11-year title drought.
The Broncos coach lauded his troops’ efforts in qualifying for the top four but said the job wasn’t done yet as Brisbane braced for the month that would make or break their premiership dream.
Bennett has a longstanding mantra about his players “paying the price” and it was that philosophy which underpinned Brisbane’s most recent premiership victory in their defeat of Melbourne in the 2006 grand final.
Asked if his class of 2017 were again ready to pay the price, Bennett was unequivocal.
“We’re going to find out,” he said ahead of tonight’s en- counter with their 2015 grand final nemesis.
“The guys paid a price to get here – but there is another month to go after this.
“We’ll answer that question a lot better in the next month.
“We’re as good as anybody else.
“A lot of our critics didn’t think we were going to make the top eight, so who knows what we can do from here?”
Bennett hit out at suggestions the Broncos were feeling the heat after former Brisbane hitman Peter Ryan arrived at training this week to help the squad with some defensive techniques.
Before the Eels clash, Bennett admitted his singular fear was his team not turning up when it mattered.
But he insisted Ryan’s presence at Red Hill should not be viewed as a sign Brisbane were losing faith in their structures.
“There is still a lot of upside in this team,” he said.
“I just want to move on from it (the Eels loss).
“If we were doing it all season, it would be a different matter, but we haven’t been doing it all season ... 21 (good defensive efforts) out of 23 games isn’t too bad.
“To be honest, Peter Ryan was talking about coming for the last couple of weeks.
“You guys (the media) had a ball with it, but that’s OK.
“It took a lot of issues away, which was good.”