Panthers comebacks can't hide slow starts

NRL comeback kings or not, Anthony Griffin says his Penrith side needs to address the issue of slow starts after their fighting 18-14 win over South Sydney on Saturday.

For the second week in a row at Panthers Stadium the hosts fought back from a 14-0 deficit with three second-half tries to down the Rabbitohs and go into the NRL's top four.

But the wins tally isn't telling the full story of what's exactly happening out west.

The Panthers have conceded early tries in both wins against the Eels and Rabbitohs, before their attack kicked into gear after the half-time break.

And while they might have been tough enough to get the job done for the last two weeks, the general feel is the slow starts must pick up sooner rather than later.

"The first couple of weeks being down like that, we don't want to be down like that," Griffin said.

"The positive is if we were losing and not showing much fight it would be an issue. The fact we can get ourselves back into the game.

"They're a mentally tough group and they can overcome those starts early. We need to fix those, but there are a lot of positives as well."

Penrith's first-half concerns have dated back to late last season, despite the team going on a run to make the 2017 finals.

Going back to last July, the Panthers have now only led at half-time in three of 11 matches.

However, the side has still gone on to win eight of those.

On Saturday, the Panthers missed 15 tackles and failed to convert any of the 19 play-the-balls inside the Rabbitohs' 20-metre zone into points.

And captain Peter Wallace admitted last week's win over Parramatta was touched on at half-time before both statistical categories improved significantly after the break.

"It was a little bit of a carbon copy," Wallace said.

"We came in at halftime down again, and we new if we could get our share of the ball we could get ourselves a shot. And it panned out that way."