{"id":75436,"date":"2026-08-19T06:20:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T06:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/75436\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T06:20:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T06:20:11","slug":"perth-bears-in-race-to-sign-one-game-nrl-player-who-left-the-penrith-panthers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/75436\/","title":{"rendered":"Perth Bears in race to sign one-game NRL player who left the Penrith Panthers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Perth Bears<\/a> are in talks with former Penrith Panthers<\/a> forward Zac Lipowicz after his Super League club confirmed his exit. Lipowicz has been in brilliant form for the Catalans Dragons since joining from the Panthers at the start of the 2026 season.<\/p>\n

Lipowicz has scored six tries with the Dragons sitting in eighth on the ladder in the Super League. Although the club confirmed he will take up an option to join an NRL club next season and depart.<\/p>\n

\"Zac<\/p>\n

The Perth Bears are in talks with former Penrith Panthers forward Zac Lipowicz (pictured second from right). (Getty Images)<\/p>\n

This decision saw the Dragons offload the 24-year-old to rival club Wakefield Trinity for the remainder of the season with both parties agreeing a deal. Wakefield have suffered a number of injuries in recent weeks and Lipowicz will help bolster their depth as they look to play finals footy.<\/p>\n

Following his stint at the backend of the Super League season with Wakefield he will then come back to Australia. And Yahoo Sports Australia understands the Bears are in talks to bring Lipowicz to Perth.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

ESPN<\/a> reported a number of Super League and NRL teams were interested in Lipowicz. And the Bears are one of those teams. Lipowicz’s sole game for the Panthers came in Round 26 last year when Ivan Cleary rested a host of players ahead of the club’s finals push. Lipowicz’s played in the defeat to the Bulldogs, but has since gone over and showed his talent at the French-based club.<\/p>\n

Lipowicz said he was excited to join Wakefield for the remainder of the season. “I’m excited to be joining Wakefield Trinity, the club has shown great ambition over the past few years. They’ve played some incredible rugby league so far in 2026 and I can’t wait to meet the boys and get stuck in until the end of the season,” he said in a club statement.<\/p>\n

\"Zac<\/p>\n

Zac Lipowicz (pictured) is in talks with the Perth Bears. (Photo by Mark Metcalfe\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Mal Meninga building Perth Bears squad<\/p>\n

The Perth Bears are building their roster for next season having landed another one of Penrith’s premiership squad members after announcing the signing of young halfback Jack Cole<\/a>. Mal Meninga<\/a>‘s side, who have also signed Broncos’ grand final winners<\/a> Gehamat Shibasaki and Tyson Smoothy in recent days.<\/p>\n

And the acquisition of Cole represents another raid from the Bears on the powerhouse Penrith club. Meninga has already lured premiership-winning forwards<\/a> Scott Sorensen and Liam Henry from Ivan Cleary’s Panthers.<\/p>\n

The Bears also announced the signing of Canberra Raiders lock Morgan Smithies. Reports suggest forward Corey Horsburgh will also join him in Perth<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Mal<\/p>\n

Bears coach Mal Meninga (pictured) is building his roster for their inaugural season. (Photo by Paul Kane\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Perth Bears are in talks with former Penrith Panthers forward Zac Lipowicz after his Super League club…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":75437,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[110856,2709,5342,372,796,335,12377,3514,35578,12375,110855],"class_list":["post-75436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-perth","tag-catalans-dragons","tag-getty-images","tag-ivan-cleary","tag-mal-meninga","tag-penrith-panthers","tag-perth","tag-perth-bears","tag-super-league","tag-the-bears","tag-wakefield-trinity","tag-zac-lipowicz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75436\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}