Dragons vs Panthers NRL Rd 2 betting tips – Friday, March 18

Friday night the St George-Illawarra Dragons host the Penrith Panthers at Kogarah in Sydney, where both sides have come off a dominant round one win, but in vastly different fashions. The Dragons warmed into a red-hot second half, scoring three tries in 20 minutes to beat the New Zealand Warriors by two converted tries, while the Penrith Panthers completely bashed the Manly Sea Eagles to win by more than three converted tries.

Penrith had a total of 59% possession on Thursday night, running for over 2000m and completing just over 85% of their sets. The Panthers physically dominated a Manly side that failed in real ‘effort areas’ of the game, like kick chasing and cover defence, all while being more disciplined with the ball and making more effective tackles.

While it was pieces of individual brilliance from rookie Izaak Tago and 2021 Grand Final intercept hero Stephen Crichton that brought two unanswered tries to Penrith early in the game, it was fatigue from the Sea Eagles that showed when second rower Liam Martin and hooker Api Koroisau scored late in the game. It’s this dominance that Penrith showed in Round One that, should it be replicated, will go a long way to making their season start 2/2 in their title defence.

It was not a lack of effort that saw the Dragons concede three tries on Saturday, but small lapses in concentration that led to the tries of Dallin Watene-Zelezniak and Wayde Egan. Moses Mbye provided great impact off the bench, but it was the finishing skills of Mikaele Ravalawa that delivered himself a hat-trick and the Dragons the win.

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His hattrick would not have come if it weren’t for the monster touch finding kick from Ben Hunt to set up the Dragons field position for their first try, and Zac Lomax’s isolation of his opposing centre to create the time and space for Ravalawa to find the in-goal area. Pair this with the incredible performances of Blake Lawrie, Jaydn Su’a, Jack De Belin and Josh Kerr, the Dragons looked sharp in their first outing of 2022 with a great platform to build on.

KEY MATCH UP: RAVALAWA V TO’O

Both teams come into Round Two having displayed their ability to work hard through the centre third of the field, capitalizing on both field position and opposition mistakes. Playing on the side wing, the battle of Mikaele Ravalawa and Brian To’o will prove to be most interesting. As strong a display as he showed last week, Ravalawa will not want to be making some of the mistakes he did against the Warriors. Brian To’o may have battled an injury towards the end of the 2021 season, but he was strong as ever in Round One producing 176m and three tackle breaks.

Dragons vs Panthers Betting Picks

The scoreboard was not reflective of Penrith’s dominance in their round one win over the Manly Sea Eagles, where the score could easily have been 12 or 18 points higher. Penrith have won their last three matches against the Dragons, and considering they only allowed Manly to score 6 points last week, it’s hard to see the Dragons outperforming the Eagles. Penrith should be going on to win this match in Kogarah, and in doing so, expect to see Viliame Kikau score on an edge with lots of attacking threat, as well as a lot of smaller Dragons defenders.

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