Right Now: Panthers Sign A Strong Talented Broncos Player

The Brisbane Broncos NRLW have decided to extend the contracts of multiple players ahead of this season and will keep them at the club until the end of the 2025 season.

The Broncos have confirmed that Mele Hufanga, Gayle Broughton, Neta Nu’uausala, Tafito Lafaele, Chelsea Lenarduzzi and Skyla Adams have all put pen to paper to ink new extensions with the club.

Named the club’s NRLW Player of the Year last season, Hufanga topped the competition in line breaks (14) and was second in total tackle busts (71).

Her dominance has also seen her represent the New Zealand Kiwi Ferns on the international level, and she scored ten tries in her first season.

Fellow New Zealand teammate Gayle Broughton has also re-signed after joining from the Parramatta Eels NRLW and transitioned from fullback to a role in the halves.

A 2020 Olympics Gold medallist, she is an icon in both the NRLW and Rugby Sevens and managed four tries, four try assists, and six line-break assists in 2023.

“I am truly excited to have re-signed with such an incredible team and I’m even more eager as to what lies ahead for us in 2024,” Broughton told Broncos Media.

As Nu’uausala, Lafaele and Lenarduzzi will also remain at the club, Under-19s Queensland representative Skyla Adams has earned a contract upgrade and will be promoted to the Broncos Top 24 roster.

 

 

Storm coach Craig Bellamy was shocked to hear his outfit were placed at the top of the competition ladder after a hard-fought 34-32 win over the Broncos.

Melbourne scraped home after a Jahrome Hughes masterclass, scoring in the 76th minute to put the game out of Brisbane’s reach, with 11 tries scored across 80 minutes.

Speaking in the post-match press conference, Bellamy was asked if he was happy with his team’s position at the top of the ladder.

He clearly had no idea the Storm had leapfrogged the Dolphins, Panthers, Cowboys and Sharks, but three of those teams have games in hand in Round 5.

“Who us? Are we? I didn’t know that,” Bellamy said.

“A couple of games to be played, Dolphins still have to play, but at the moment,” Fox League’s Lara Pitt said.

“So tomorrow we will be third,” Bellamy replied.

“I’m not quite sure where we are on the table but at the end of the day it’s way too early to be looking at the table.

“We only look at the table about two thirds of the way through and then try to work out a little bit of a plan there.

“We just take each week as it comes, each training session as it comes, but hopefully for my sake mainly we can be a little more consistent.”

Thursday night’s clash also marked a return for star five-eighth Cameron Munster, who missed the start of the season with a groin injury that was the result of a shower accident.

The 29-year-old broke two tackles and assisted two line breaks against the Broncos, and Bellamy was impressed by his first display of the season.

“I’ll give him a B+, maybe an A, we will give him an A,” Bellamy said.

“He didn’t do too much off the top of his head, I thought he defended well. Some of his kicks were probably not that great.

“But I thought he defended well and came up with the right option at the right time, it’s good to have him back and you’d like to think now he will just get better.

“He played outside Shawn (Blore) tonight, he hasn’t played much with him and hasn’t trained much with him, you’d like to think those combinations will get better.”

Kevin Walters’ outfit were doing everything they could to snatch victory of the Broncos in the closing minutes, with debutant Benjamin Te Kura getting on the score sheet.

For Bellamy, he revealed his team should have capitalised on their strong first-half performance.

“We are probably a little bit disappointed, especially the first half we had plenty of play that we didn’t take as much advantage out of it that we should have,” Bellamy said.

“It got into a to-and-fro in the second half, and they have a couple of players so they’ve done really well. They were grand finalists last year too.

“So we know they are a really good side… they were still in it with a couple of minutes to go. I don’t know how you describe that game, but most people would have enjoyed watching it if you weren’t a Storm or Broncos supporter.”