Penrith’s Four-Peat, the Fall, and the Fight to Get Back
For four years, the last weekend of an NRL season had a predictable ending. Penrith won the 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024 grand finals — four premierships in a row, a run matched by only one club in the competition’s history: St George, whose eleven straight titles between 1956 and 1966 belong to an era the modern salary cap has made unrepeatable. Penrith’s four was the closest anything has come to that since, and for a while it looked like it might not stop at four.
Then, in 2025, it did — and not in the way anyone expected.
The dynasty that didn’t make the grand final
Penrith didn’t lose the 2025 grand final. They didn’t reach it. The club that had been unbeatable in September for four straight years finished the regular season 7th, forcing them to start their finals campaign from the bottom of the eight instead of the top. They won their way through two rounds — a 24-8 win over the Warriors, then a 46-26 win over Canterbury-Bankstown — before running into Brisbane in the preliminary final and losing 14-16. One score away from a fifth straight grand final, and the run was over. Brisbane went on to beat Melbourne 26-22 in the decider a week later.
It was the first time since 2020 that Penrith’s season had ended anywhere other than a grand final.
Back on top
A club coming off its first finals miss in half a decade might have been expected to take a step back in 2026. Instead Penrith finished the regular season as minor premiers again, and opened their finals campaign the way they used to define — a win over the Sydney Roosters in the qualifying final, sending them straight into a preliminary final without needing to survive an elimination match first.
Whatever happens from here, that alone says something about how quickly this group can reset. A club doesn’t go from a shock finals exit to minor premiers by accident.
What a fifth title would mean
Nobody has won five NRL premierships in six seasons in the modern era. If Penrith goes all the way this October, that’s the history on the table — not just another premiership, but proof that 2025 was the exception and not the beginning of the end. If they don’t, 2025 starts to look less like a blip and more like the moment the era turned. Either way, the preliminary final they’re already through to is the biggest step in finding out which.
