Everyone says your team must finish in the top four if they want to win the NRL premiership.
But what do the numbers actually say and, perhaps more pertinently, are they even relevant in 2025?
After all, until two years ago no team had featured in four consecutive NRL grand finals or won three premierships in a row—both records then went spectacularly out the window courtesy of the Penrith Panthers.
Based on pure statistics, there’s little question the odds are stacked heavily against teams that finish outside the top four, a position from which no club has ever won the title in 27 NRL seasons.
MORE: When was the last time the Canberra Raiders won the minor premiership?
Minor premiers have won ten NRL premierships, second has claimed eight, third has lifted the trophy six times and fourth has triumphed on three occasions.
This isn’t to say lower ranked teams haven’t given it a real shake, mind you.
Several clubs have been within tantalising reach of snapping the top-four hoodoo, with eight runners up since 1998 coming from outside the four—that’s thirty percent of all NRL seasons.
The eighth-placed Parramatta Eels of 2009 went close, with coach Daniel Anderson’s side falling 23-16 to the Melbourne Storm who, in a cruel twist of irony, would later be stripped of the title anyway due to salary cap breaches.
Penalty try causes premiership pain
But no NRL team has ever been closer than the sixth-placed St. George Illawarra Dragons side of 1999.
Having led by 14 points into the second half of the decider, the David Waite coached Dragons ended agonisingly short after one of the more controversial finishes in grand final history, conceding a penalty try in the 76th minute to the Melbourne Storm who went on to win the premiership, 20-18, in only their second year in the competition.
2025 has already proven one of the more closely fought seasons in NRL history.
With the all-conquering Panthers currently lurking just outside the top four, not to mention the dangerously enigmatic Broncos and Dolphins, could this be the season the top four hoodoo is finally broken?
NRL Grand Finalist Ladder Positions 1998-2024
2024 | Panthers (2nd) def Storm (1st) |
2023 | Panthers (1st) def Broncos (2nd) |
2022 | Panthers (1st) def Eels (4th) |
2021 | Panthers (2nd) def Rabbitohs (3rd) |
2020 | Storm (2nd) def Panthers (1st) |
2019 | Roosters (2nd) def Raiders (4th) |
2018 | Roosters (1st) def Storm (2nd) |
2017 | Storm (1st) def Cowboys (8th) |
2016 | Sharks (3rd) def Storm (1st) |
2015 | Cowboys (3rd) def Broncos (2nd) |
2014 | Rabbitohs (3rd) def Bulldogs (7th) |
2013 | Roosters (1st) def Sea Eagles (4th) |
2012 | Storm (2nd) def Bulldogs (1st) |
2011 | Sea Eagles (2nd) def Warriors (6th) |
2010 | Dragons (1st) def Roosters (6th) |
2009 | Storm (4th*) def Eels (8th) |
2008 | Manly (2nd) def Storm (1st*) |
2007 | Storm (1st*) def Sea Eagles (2nd) |
2006 | Broncos (3rd) def Storm (1st*) |
2005 | Tigers (4th) def Cowboys (5th) |
2004 | Bulldogs (2nd) def Roosters (1st) |
2003 | Panthers (1st) def Roosters (2nd) |
2002 | Roosters (4th) def Warriors (1st) |
2001 | Knights (3rd) def Eels (1st) |
2000 | Broncos (1st) def Roosters (2nd) |
1999 | Storm (3rd) def Dragons (6th) |
1998 | Broncos (1st) def Bulldogs (9th) |