2021 NRL Finals Week 1 Tips & Preview

2021 NRL Finals Week 1 Tips & Preview

The 2021 NRL Finals Series has arrived and the real season begins on the Sunshine Coast on Friday night.

The Storm and the Sea Eagles renew their bitter and storied rivalry first-up, before the Neds Titans look to continue their season at the expense of the Roosters.

The Panthers play the Bunnies, the Eels square off with the Knights, and $2 lines are available on all four matches in Week 1 of the 2021 NRL Finals here at Neds!

Melbourne Storm vs Manly Sea Eagles
Sea Eagles (+8.5)

The 2021 NRL Finals Series gets underway with a bang on Friday night with a fixture that wouldn’t look out of place on Grand Final Day.

They were a little slow out of the blocks, but the Melbourne Storm have once again been the NRL’s benchmark in 2021, recording 19 consecutive victories on their way to yet another minor premiership.

Their incredible production line has continued to yield outstanding talent, and they appear to be on the short and narrow towards another deep run.

Standing in their way this week are the Manly Sea Eagles, a team who have returned some of the most exciting performances of the year, highlighted by arguably one of the best solo seasons ever produced by a player, Tom Trbojevic.

Turbo missed plenty of games at the beginning of the year and throughout the Origin period, but he has still quite clearly been the NRL’s best player, and he is the key to Manly’s continued success throughout the finals.

The Storm have opened reasonably firm and justifiable favourites, and I do think that they will win this game, but the Sea Eagles can certainly make a contest of it.

Sydney Roosters vs Gold Coast Titans
Titans (+10.5)

The Neds Gold Coast Titans are into the finals!

It took every match of the regular season and there were plenty of highs and low, but the ultimate goal of Justin Holbrook’s men in 2021 was to the make the final eight, and they’ve bloody gone and done it!

Last week’s performance and win over the Warriors was probably their best of the season; it was tough, convincing and bolstered by some seriously impressively footy, and they will be rightly confident of pulling off an upset on Saturday afternoon.

The Roosters have been thereabouts all year, but really have limped into the 2021 NRL Finals, and I for one would not be surprised to see them knocked out of the race this week.

The put paid to a desperate Raiders side last week, but they’ve been pretty inconsistent recently and certainly cannot afford to underestimate the Titans.

I think that this match will go right down to the wire, and for that reason, I think that the value lies with backing the Titans to cover the line as outsiders.

Penrith Panthers vs South Sydney Rabbitohs
SGM: To'o 2+ Tries/Panthers (-11.5)

Betting suggests that the most one-sided final in Week 1 will materialise between the second-placed Panthers and third-placed Rabbitohs on Saturday.

The Panthers’ season looked to be in all sorts when Nathan Cleary, Jarome Luai and Brian To’o all went down after Origin, but with those three players back in the fold and in outstanding form, there’s still plenty of fight left in the men from the mountains.

In my humble opinion, they are one of two teams (alongside Manly) capable of upsetting the Storm in a Grand Final, and they can keep themselves on the correct side of the draw by winning this match.

Souths are another side who have lost their consistency heading into the finals, and their premiership claims certainly haven’t been helped by the loss of Latrell Mitchell.

They still boast plenty of stars and scoring potential, but I think that the loss of a player of Mitchell’s ability will be telling against a team like the Panthers.

best bet
Parramatta Eels vs Newcastle Knights
Eels (-8)

Eight will become six following Sunday afternoon’s do-or-die game between the Parramatta Eels and Newcastle Knights in Rockhampton.

Eels fans surely still shudder at the thought of 2001, when they were virtually bomb-proof all season before receiving a genuine touch-up by the Knights in the GF.

That was 20 years ago, but they are widely expected to deliver on firm favouritism once more, and they can’t afford a lacklustre effort, or they’ll be done again.

Brad Arthur’s boys were no match for the rampant Panthers last week (though they were extremely understrength), and they did deliver the Storm their first loss for donkey’s years the week prior.

The Knights won passage into the 2021 NRL Finals with a week to spare, and good thing, because they were awful again in the Broncos in Round 25.

They’d need to improve noticeably to win this game, and I think that the bookies have just about got this one correct.