Saturday, 17 August 2019:

Tigers coach IVAN CLEARY

Despite Penrith's "immature" display in their 24-12 NRL loss to Brisbane, Panthers coach Ivan Cleary is still backing his side to come of age ahead of the finals.

The Panthers looked like boys against men when teenage prop Payne Haas sealed the stirring Broncos victory with a stunning 45m try in the 72nd minute at Suncorp Stadium.

Haas busted through four defenders, even running around fullback Dylan Edwards to score the match-winner.

The heroics from 19-year-old Haas blew Penrith's missed tackle count out to a worrying 38 - a week after the Panthers missed 46 in their win over Cronulla.

Brisbane provisionally leapfrogged Penrith into seventh spot with their second straight win on Friday night.

"In many ways I thought the first half was immature and I think we have an immature team," Cleary said.

"So it is not completely surprising away from home in a place like here (Suncorp) where there is a lot going on.

"I thought we started the game really well and we could have put them under all sorts of pressure, but we shot ourselves in the foot.

"We have got a lot of young guys and they have got to learn the hard way, so they will."

Cleary didn't have to be told the Panthers also needed to learn some hard lessons in defence after missing a staggering 84 tackles in their last two games.

"We have a lot of work to do defensively," he conceded.

"You can't go conceding points as easily in the second half as we did (against Brisbane)."

Still, Cleary backed his side to bounce back and launch a top-eight tilt in their next round clash with North Queensland.

"We have just got to dust ourselves off and get up to Townsville next week and make sure we put in a good display and get the points there," he said.

"We will see where we sit after that. A lot is going to happen in the next three weeks, so all we can control is our own performance and that is what we will be doing."

In another concern for Cleary, damaging forward Viliame Kikau was placed on report for a high tackle on Broncos centre Kotoni Staggs.

AAP