The Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs have held out a gallant Penrith Panthers outfit at St Marys Leagues Stadium, prevailing 18-14 in their second win in the 2017 Intrust Super Premiership NSW.
At 20 years of age, usual bench player Lachlan Lewis sufficiently filled the shoes of NRL debutant Matt Frawley in the halves, alongside Josh Cleeland who looked dangerous for the game's duration. Panthers rake Mitch Rein also played strongly and while the home side were not too far off the pace, the Bulldogs put forward their best performance of the year to register back-to-back wins.
Things started strongly for the Bulldogs, with prop Francis Tualau crossing from dummy-half on the back of a penalty. The Panthers' Mitch Rein, however, continued to show he has the ability of the top grade with a four-pointer of his own just five minutes later. Both tries were converted for a 6-6 scoreline early on.
From then on, it was all the visitors with two of their key men contributing to a handy lead. Five-eighth Josh Cleeland crossed from close range as the first quarter of the game came to a close, before no.9 Craig Garvey made the most of some lacklustre Panthers defence under the posts. With successive conversions from Rhyse Martin, Canterbury-Bankstown led Penrith 18-6.
