Fantasy football: Inside the NRL season where anything can happen

Hands up anyone who thought the Panthers, Wests Tigers, Warriors and Cowboys would be the top four after six rounds.

And did anyone seriously think the Storm would be the 13th and the Raiders 15th heading into a Round 7 showdown in Canberra?

Would you have tipped Thomas Jenkins to be the leading tryscorer with a record tally of 14 and Warriors warhorse Jackson Ford to be leading the Dally Ms with 23 votes?

Feel free to give yourself a huge pat on the back if you saw any of that coming!

Welcome to the 2026 NRL Telstra Premiership… the ultimate Dream Factory where Wests Tigers and Newcastle are up 11 spots on where they finished the regular season last year and the Storm are staring down five losses in a row for the first time since 2012.

But never fear, Storm fans, your team never dropped below third on the ladder even through that run of outs, went on to finish second after 26 rounds and win the premiership.

While the table topping Panthers are doing what they have done for the past six seasons, Wests Tigers and the Cowboys have flipped the script and thrown the form guide out the window to have their fans dreaming of a repeat of the 2005 grand final when Benji Marshall and Todd Payten shared premiership glory as Tigers teammates.

On a magical night at Telstra Stadium, Benji threw that flick pass, Payten iced the win with the final try and Wests Tigers had a title in just their sixth season as a joint venture.

The Cowboys had to wait another decade for their maiden premiership but the wait was well and truly worth it as Michael Morgan’s miracle pass and Johnathan Thurston’s golden point field goal secured a 17-16 win over arch-rivals Brisbane.

The other member of our top four after six rounds of fast and furious action are the Warriors, daring to dream of their first ever premiership in their 32nd season in the competition.

The men from Auckland were runners-up in 2002 and 2011 and made an emotion-charged run to the 2023 preliminary final and now with the aforementioned Ford ripping in alongside James Fisher-Harris, Leka Halasima, Erin Clark and departing club legend Roger Tuivasa-Sheck, there’s a real sense of destiny around the Wahs.

One club that has had little trouble collecting premierships down through the years are the Rabbitohs, currently sitting fifth, a jump of nine places on where they finished a disappointing 2025 campaign.

South Sydney’s famous 2014 grand final victory made it 21 premierships for the cardinal and myrtle but after a 12-year wait they are hungry for more.

The 2026 season has already delivered the Rabbitohs a ‘pinch me’ moment when Alex Johnston broke Ken Irvine’s long-standing tryscoring record but that was March 13 and a hell of a lot has happened since then in the Dream Factory.

A week later the Bunnies lowered Wests Tigers’ colours in Gosford – the only team to beat Benji’s boys so far in 2026.

Two weeks after that they took down the Bulldogs in another memorable Good Friday showdown in front of 50,000 fans at Accor Stadium.

Not to be deterred, the Bulldogs dusted themselves off and returned to the same venue six days later to stun the previously undefeated Panthers.

If you saw that one coming, give yourself a pat on the back.

And so to Round 7, where the Panthers head to Darwin to try and hit back against the Dolphins, whose electric fullback Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow has scored six tries in three games against Penrith.

The Cowboys are chasing five consecutive wins for the first time since 2023 as they host the resurgent Sea Eagles, who have won two straight since Kieran Foran took over.

Then there’s the Knights, flying high in sixth spot but still licking their wounds after a 20-point loss to Wests Tigers.

They confront a Roosters side full of confidence after overcoming a 16-point deficit to down the Sharks in Perth and boasting eight wins in their last nine games against the Knights.

If the Knights are to hit back it could come down to the fantastic finishing skills of Englishman Dom Young, who has scored nine tries in six games to sit second behind the purring Panther Jenkins on the tryscoring list.

Can dashing Dom run ‘Milky’ down or will Storm dynamo Sua Faalogo (8 tries) go past both of them by season’s end to become the first Melbourne player to top the tryscoring charts since Suliasi Vunivalu in 2016 and 2017.

So many scenarios and so much to play out across a season that shapes as the most unpredictable in recent memory.

Buckle up for the ride!