Contact<\/a><\/p>\nThe award winning writers of the nation’s greatest soap opera are sharpening their pencils today, as they script the final episodes of the NRL 2026 season.<\/p>\n
With the Penrith Panthers and Newcastle Knights facing off in a David vs. Goliath battle prelim at Olympic Park, it\u2019s understood the six writers at NRL headquarters are split down the middle, on which narrative will be the most profitable for the game. <\/p>\n
Squinting at a whiteboard covered in sticky notes and marker pen strokes, head writer David Vautin is backing the mountain men to make it to the Grand Final.<\/p>\n
An NRL script writing veteran, whose portfolio includes great storylines such as \u201cPaul Gallen\u2019s turn your porch lights off\u201d and the \u201c2015 Thurston Fairytale\u201d, David Vautin knows what sells newspapers and keeps TV ratings ticking.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it should be Penrith. We\u2019re talking dynasty. We\u2019re talking Cleary immortal. Yeo with a ruptured pec. More fuel on the \u201cWhere will Ivan and Nathan go next?\u201d chat. That narrative alone could keep the back pages talking until Christmas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not to be outvoiced by the opinions of an NRL script writing veteran, young gun writer Ben Simpson has piped up, suggesting a few kind penalties to the Knights could really flip the season on it\u2019s head.<\/p>\n
\u201cHave you read the news lately mate? The regional working class need something to believe in! Imagine Newcastle. Holbrook takes them from Spooners to Premiers. Kalyn as the \u2018Prince That Was Promised\u2019. It\u2019s Joey and Matty hugging on Nobbys Beach. It\u2019s Silverchair. It\u2019s a week long bender for a city that can\u2019t wait to erupt.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cPenrith is boring, it\u2019s been done. I say give the Knights a few generous six-agains, maybe a Liam Martin send off, and some tries that definitely should\u2019ve gone to the bunker, and we\u2019ll get the red to look the other way. Let the Novocastrians sing!\u201d<\/p>\n
More to come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KEITH T. DENNET\u00a0|\u00a0South\u00a0|\u00a0Contact The award winning writers of the nation’s greatest soap opera are sharpening their pencils today,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":906799,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-906798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=906798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/906799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=906798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=906798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=906798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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