The 2005 Brisbane Broncos season was the eighteenth in the club's history, and they competed in the NRL's 2005 Telstra Premiership. Coached by Wayne Bennett and captained by Darren Lockyer, they finished the regular season 3rd (out of 15) despite ending the year with another long losing streak which continued into the play-offs and saw them knocked out once again.
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Season summary
With Gorden Tallis' retirement at the end of the previous season, the Broncos' captaincy was passed onto star fullback-turned-5/8th Darren Lockyer. In round 1 of NRL season 2005 Lockyer led the Broncos out for the first time and won 29-16 against the North Queensland Cowboys, the team that knocked them out of the finals in their last match the previous year. Three weeks later, the Broncos suffered their worst defeat in the clubs history with a 50-4 loss to the Melbourne Storm at Olympic Park. After this match, the Broncos won their next ten matches straight from round 5 to round 17 to lead the competition, only to lose their last five regular season game in a row from round 22 to round 26, finishing third heading into the finals. The losing streak extended into the finals with defeats in the Qualifying Final to the Melbourne Storm 24-18 and in the Semi Final to the Wests Tigers 34-6, sending them out of the competition and making it seven consecutive losses in and seven straight finals losses for the Broncos.
At the end of the 2005 season, after five successive years without a grand final appearance, Bennett decided to have a cleanout of the coaching staff, removing such long-time allies as Gary Belcher, Glenn Lazarus and Kevin Walters.