It was hard to work out, during the 34-12 win, exactly how the men in black’s season got to the point where they have to win probably all their remaining matches to make the finals.

For the time being, they are only three points behind fifth-placed Orange Hawks, but that doesn’t take into account the fact that Hawks have already had their second bye.

That leaves the Panthers’ season hanging by a thread.

Their display against Mudgee was worthy of the competition leaders themselves.

“We showed what we can do when we play our best,” stand-in skipper Matt Rose said after the match.

“There wasn’t a bad player on the field today. The guys who came off the bench all did a job. Young Jed Betts backed up from under 18s and was outstanding.

“Luke Carpenter and Trent Rose, in particular, Jake Betts as well – those three were superb, and big ‘Oscar’ [Osea Sadrau] was very good today as well.”

It was an entertaining affair and not as one-sided as the scoreline suggested.

The hits were big, the breaks were frequent, the offloads and the clever kicks never far away.

Carpenter was the best player on the field, making three long breaks of 50-plus metres out of dummy-half, while Trent Rose and Jake Betts got through 20 and 26 hit-ups respectively.

As Matt Rose pointed out, though, all players had a role.

Chris Shephard had one of his best games in the top grade, making a couple of breaks and doing plenty of work out of dummy-half to get the ball away from his own try-line.

William ‘Bubba’ Kennedy did likewise and chimed in with some crucial tackles to boot.

Young centres Mitch Davis and Blake Lawson both came up with some big plays, particularly in defence, and Lawson’s battle with Tom Lewsley was entertaining.

Blake Dean came off the bench and into the halves and, along with Rose, played a key role in setting up some good attacking raids.

The Panthers looked at their best when they were shifting the ball to their right, where they repeatedly stretched the Dragons.

But just as important was their defence.

“We knew that Jack Afamasaga was going to be the important man for them – he gets the ball away so often in tackles and breaks through the line a lot,” Matt Rose said.

“We were able to shut him down, though. He still had a good game, but he didn’t really have any impact and we were able to get numbers around him throughout the game.

“To do all of that without the Seager brothers, who were both missing through injury, it says a lot about the sort of football we’re capable of.”