Broncos & Stoke City

Last result of 2026 — still the latest

Last six games of the season

The Suncorp ledger — the whole story in one table

This table exists because two true numbers were in circulation this week and looked like they contradicted each other. AAP's review coverage said Brisbane lost 12 of 14 at Suncorp; this page has been running 2–10 at home. Both are right. Brisbane played two further games at Suncorp that were not home fixtures — the Warriors in Magic Round (Round 11, where the Warriors were the designated home side) and the Dolphins in Round 23, which was the Dolphins' home game. They lost both. Full working in the verification note.

2026 by the numbers — final

Final 2026 ladder

Rebuilt again this week from a completely independent baseline — Wikipedia's Round 26 table plus the eight Round 27 scorelines — and it agrees with last week's published ladder on sixteen of seventeen clubs. One figure has been corrected: Parramatta's differential is −181, not the −183 printed last week. The Eels stay 13th either way. Last week's flagged uncertainty over Cronulla's +149 is now closed out in the feed's favour — the drift was in this page's own baseline. Working below.

The finals — where it's up to

Eliminated: South Sydney and North Queensland. Penrith and the Dolphins have the week off and will host preliminary finals on the weekend of 26–27 September. The Dolphins winning their first-ever finals match — from 16–6 down in Auckland — is the sort of thing Brisbane supporters are contractually obliged to have an opinion about. Dane Gagai, who joins Brisbane next year, was among Newcastle's best on Friday night.

Worth knowing

• The review is in, and it says the problem was defence. Handed down Friday 11 September: Brisbane conceded 677 points, their worst since 2021, and spent most of the year without a permanent defensive coach after Ben Te'o resigned early following disagreements with Maguire. Matt Ballin now owns defence, Trent Barrett stays on attack, another development coach will be hired alongside Adam Brideson, and Troy Thomson becomes executive general manager of football. Pre-season is being rebuilt and travel restricted to Australia and New Zealand.
• Maguire's future is settled, and it settled the ordinary way. He will see out the third year of his contract. CEO Dave Donaghy: "We will invest further in our coaching and development resources, supporting our head coach Michael Maguire, who last year became only the second coach in our club's history to win a premiership." Last week this page reported Brisbane were weighing an open-ended, clause-driven deal; that idea did not survive the review, and the club has simply backed the contract it already has.
• Correction on Xavier Willison, and it matters. He is contracted through the end of 2027, not off contract now — so the "can talk to rivals from 1 November" line this page ran last week was a year early. That date is 1 November 2027. He declined Brisbane's July offer — reportedly $900k-plus a season to 2030 — rather than merely stalling on it, and James Hooper has since linked South Sydney with him for 2028, via the same manager who took Haas there. Souths have their own cap problems, so treat it as noise for now. The relevant fact is that Brisbane's best young forward has said no once already.
• Reece Walsh is in Australia's extended World Cup squad, and that is not the same as being picked. He is one of 40 named in the preliminary pool, which will be cut after the Grand Final. He will arrive fit "but not by much", with no football since Round 24, and Dylan Edwards and James Tedesco are also in the squad after being left out of the Ashes side. Australia open against New Zealand at Allianz Stadium on Thursday 15 October, 8:05pm.
• Payne Haas is having two fingers pinned. Surgery this week on the ring and little fingers of his left hand, which NRL Physio says he has been playing through since about Round 2. His World Cup — for Samoa, having switched allegiance last year — is in doubt. "I'll talk to the medical team this week and see what happens from there," he said after the Canterbury game. Missing the finals gives him a month.
• A fifth 2027 signing: Wilson De Courcey. Twenty-year-old outside back from Newcastle on a two-year deal, 14 tries in 17 NSW Cup games this season at 126 metres a game, NRL debut in Round 5. He turned down a Knights extension after being dropped in Round 6. He replaces some of what Shibasaki and Arthars take with them, and follows Dane Gagai out of Newcastle.
• Adam Reynolds has walked the rift back. Having told NRL 360 that his omission from the last two games was "news to him", he later accepted the call was his own and said the whole thing had been "blown out of proportion". Maguire, on 3 September: "We're working through what his role will be. He'll be around the club for sure… It would be crazy not to use Reyno." A halves-coaching brief mentoring Thomas Duffy and Jonah Pezet remains the expectation.
• And the silliest item of the week. Melbourne lodged a formal complaint about Brisbane's ground announcer — former Bronco Alex Glenn — leading crowd noise while Storm players were under high balls at Suncorp. The NRL issued guidance to clubs. Glenn's defence: "It's harmless, it's harmless, I've been doing it all year… to every opposition." He is expected to keep the microphone in 2027. Given the home record, it plainly wasn't working.