National Rugby League (NRL) Preview & Betting Guide

National Rugby League Preview

Who won the National Rugby League?

The Penrith Panthers are the current reigning champions, having won their sixth title in 2024, which was also their fourth consecutive title by defeating Melbourne Storm 14-6 in the Grand Final.

When is the National Rugby League?

The league takes place between March and October. The 2025 season kicked off on the 1st of March and will conclude on the 5th of October.

Who are the favourites to win the National Rugby League?

The Penrith Panthers went into the new season as the pre-season favourites on the back of four consecutive titles. Can they make it five on the spin this season?

Melbourne Storm were also towards the head of the betting market, they won it in both 2017 & 2020 whilst also runners-up in 2016, 2018 & 2024, so usually thereabouts.

Who will win the National Rugby League?

Head over to the OLBG Rugby Tips to see who they are tipping to win, not only the outright winner but also matches throughout the tournament.

Additionally, if you only want to view the tips from the top tipsters, those who have shown a profit on rugby over the past year, then head over to the Best Rugby Tipsters page.

What is the National Rugby League Format?

The 'Premiership Rounds', aka regular season, takes place over 27 weeks, the games are normally split to Thursday (x1), Friday (x2), Saturday (x3) and Sunday (x2).

So you get eight games each week, which means sixteen of the seventeen teams will be in action, with one team getting a bye week.

In terms of the scoring system, it's a fairly simple two points for a win and one point for a draw.

The top 8 teams at the end of the regular season advance to the 'Finals Series', where they compete to make it to the Grand Final.

The Grand Final will decide the champions, and it has been played at Stadium Australia in Sydney since 1999.

National Rugby League Broadcast & Scheduling Info

For residents of the UK and Ireland, you can catch all of the NRL action on the Sky Sports channels. The matches are also available to stream on the WatchNRL service.

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National Rugby League Past Winners

The South Sydney Rabbitohs have been crowned champions the most times, with an incredible twenty-one titles or 'Premiers' to their name; they have also been runners-up fourteen times, although their last success was back in 2014.

Sydney Roosters have seen more recent success with their last title coming in 2019, that win was their fifteenth title, and they have a 50/50 record for winning, having also been runners-up fifteen times.

Level with them on fifteen wins are the St. George Dragons, who won eleven consecutive titles between 1956 and 1966! The team now operates as a joint venture with the Illawarra Steelers, and they are known as the St. George Illawarra Dragons.

Another old team that now only operates as a joint venture are the Balmain Tigers, who are the only other team in double figures for wins with eleven titles; they now operate as the West Tigers.

The last ten National Rugby League Champions

National Rugby League Favourite Statistics

Favourite backers in the NRL did see things improve for successful favourites, between 2015 & 2019, not a single season saw over 70% of favourites winning.

However, that rose to 74%, 76%, 72% & 71% for the next four seasons, which was a vast improvement. Last season, though, we saw a drastic fall with only 62% of favourites being successful, that is 9% fewer than the previous season.

Melbourne Storm top the list for most reliable favourites, winning 77% of their games (169-42-8), with only two other teams with 70%+ and those are the Penrith Panthers (74%) and the Sydney Roosters (70%).

National Rugby League Odds Statistics

Here we look at how teams perform between certain odds. What we know as bettors is that those shorter in price should win more games, simple as that!

The bars shown in blue are where the odds fall within or exceeded their expected percentage, whilst those in orange fall below expectations.

The fact that four of the top seven bars are orange tells you that the short-priced favourites are not the most reliable in this league, especially those priced 1.20 to 1.69.

Those under 1.20 do hit the expected percentages, those 1.20 - 1.29 don't but are only marginally off the mark. The most unreliable are favourites priced up between 1.40 & 1.69, so be careful with those.

Tournament Betting Comparison

Here is a comparison between some of the top rugby league tournaments (Leagues) for winning favourites.

Of the three leagues we have compared, the NRL doesn't come out great as it has the worst return for winning favourites of the three leagues.

The Championship tops the list with 74% of favourites winning, then it is the Super League with 69% whilst the NRL has seen just 65% of favourites win over the past five seasons.

National Rugby League Teams

These are the seventeen teams that are competing in the 2025 National Rugby League.

ACT

Just a single team from the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) in the NRL, and that is the Canberra Raiders, who are three-time NRL winners.

New South Wales

The majority of the teams in the NRL (10 of the 17) are based in New South Wales, and that includes the two most successful teams, the South Sydney Rabbitohs (21 titles) and the Sydney Roosters (15 titles)

New Zealand

As already mentioned earlier, the league does include a single team from New Zealand, that is the New Zealand Warriors, who have been in the league since 1998; however, they are yet to win a single title.

Queensland

The are four teams based in Queensland, the Brisbane Broncos are by far the most successful of those, having won six titles, the Dolphins and Titans are yet to record a win, whilst the Cowboys won their only title in 2015.

Victoria

The Melbourne Storm are the only team based in Victoria. They won their fourth title in 2020, although that would have been their sixth because they had both their 2007 & 2009 title stripped from them due to a breach of the salary cap.

National Rugby League Records

Most National Rugby League Appearances

Only one player has passed the 400 mark in the NRL in terms of appearances, and that is Cameron Smith, who over an eighteen-year career (2002 & 2020) made 430 appearances for Melbourne Storm.

The next on the list is some fifty-eight behind Smith, and that is Cooper Cronk, who made a combined 372 appearances during his time with Melbourne Storm and the Sydney Roosters.

In terms of those still playing, both Ben Hunt and Daly Cherry-Evans have made 348 appearances; they are currently joint sixth on the list.

Most Tries in the National Rugby League

You have to go back a few years to find the player who has scored the most tries in the NRL. That man is Ken Irvine, who scored a total of 212 for North Sydney & the Sea Eagles between 1958-73.

There is only one other player in the NRL history to have scored over 200 tries, and that is Alex Johnston, who has scored 209 for the South Sydney Rabbitohs and is still playing, so could catch Irvine!

Most Points in the National Rugby League

This is another record that is topped by Cameron Smith, during his 430 games for the Storm, he accumulated a total of 2,786 points, which has him top, but for how long?

We say they because second on the list is the still active Adam Reynolds, who is currently with the Broncos, having also played for the Rabbitohs. He has 2,518 points a closing down on Smith.

Reynolds is the only active player in the top ten for most points scored, so he has the best chance of attempting to break Smith's record.