Archives, eh
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# Queensland by four and thinking.
A most un-Queensland victory…where was the Mark Coyne Speciali in the dying minutes? The closest they got to a Mark Coyne was when Channel Nine showed him shaking Mel Meniga’s hand a little prematurely.
In fact, it was the rarest of birds, the win to Queensland in a game they neither dominated nor required a MCS – they choked the NSW attack, suffocated it under a blanket of aggressive defense and scramble. Even the sole NSW try was jammy, scored when Brett Stewart ducked through a marker defense that had been opened up when Cameron Smith was bumped out of the way by a rising Jonathon Thurston. Meanwhile, Anasta lurked out to the side meancingly doing nothing.
There was a comment by Phil Gould at one stage that Queensland has the wood on Mason – that may be true to some extent. It certainly seemed like it in the first half and even the early after the break. While Anasta was efficiently achieving nothing in the back line, Mason was being kept quiet by the Queensland defense. But at some point he found life when everyone else was tiring and he tore huge holes through the line. He was probably the third best player NSW had on the field.
I think Brett Stewart shades Mason for second best in the sky-blue. He was perfectly placed to receive so many of the long kicks, he fielded high kicks, he ran well and had half breaks. There was a moment that simply had to be a planned move ii ; NSW moved the ball quickly to the left and then Jamie Lyon kicked to centre and there was Stewart racing to a ball that bounced oh-so-heart-breakingly not-quite-perfectly. If it had been just a little to the side he might have has two tries in his debut game., but it didn’t and the scrambling defense nailed him. Anasta hovered in back play, delivering nothing with his usual aplomb.
Kimmorley had only one bad kick in the entire game. The word is that when he was exiled two years ago, it wasn’t for throwing the intercept pass to Bowen, it was for an awful kicking game. They’ll never leave him out for that again, and he should be back for the third game. He might want to give some thought to how he could take an extra two steps before giving the pass to his forwards. NSW had very little in attack, and it was because Kimmorley wasn’t drawing in defense to open holes for his forwards and his running backs and an Anasta who achieved a Doctorate in Applied Nothing.
And that’s the game really. Queensland scored a couple of tries – one off what might have been a bad miss call – and held their line for 71 minutes against a NSW attack whose best metres gained were courtesy of the whistle. Lockyer and Thurston were good, although as mentioned the long kicks were being fielded on the full a lot, but not outstanding. If anything, the whole team played at a very high level, so outstanding performances merely seemed good.
I don’t remember what the penalty count ended as. Three to NSW, one to Queensland, I think. Could probably have been two all; there was a play where Lockyer had the ball knocked out by Kimmorley who never got into marker, and there was a ball lost by Mason that was ruled stripped. It probably was stripped but the Queenslander in me wants to argue poor ball control. My final word on the referee is that, you know, the pass to Price before Bell scored probably was forward.
I should let it pass and be magnanimous in victory, but I can’t. The out and out bias of the Channel Nine commentary team is increasing both in explicitness and getting-on-my-tits-ness. It aggravated me last year when Gould was heard to yell “Oh no!!!” when Locky swooped on the dropped ball to win the third match and take the series. It positively shits me when Ray Warren, when discussing what NSW needs to do to win, says “We need to do this, we need to do that.” Even Stirling, otherwise a studiously neutral analyst of the plays, joined in at moments. The worst was when Queensland was awarded their only penalty. The commentary team was initially incredulous that the penalty could be given and openly accused Price of diving from a push. On the other hand, I must have been watching another game, because I saw Price’s leg lifted when he was moving into marker, not a push. It wasn’t like it was a fast moving play the ball, it was almost languorous. Stirling, Warren and Gould just didn’t want to have to say that it was a stupid play by a team that had no way through except to interfere with the markers.
Oh, there are other things to say – how Channel Nine nearly put the mocker on by showing the Queensland management congratulating each other, and then snapping back to the action when Queensland lost the ball only a dozen metres out with twenty seconds to go when a converted try would win the game. However, such moments just kept the adrenalin and excitement at a fantastic game going until the final second.
It was the perfect game to set a number of achievements. First time a Queensland captain has led his side to back-to-back series victories since Wally back in the late eighties – Locky may well be the greatest pivot since The King as well, although Fittler begs to differ. And the hoodoo is now definitively broken – D can now come home during an Origin game and not curse Queensland to a defeat.
Oh yeah, and something about Queensland breaking a long-standing inability to win at Telstra Stadium.
Actually, one last comment. Anasta broke his hand at some stage. He may have an excuse for his dazzling display of arkle-sparkle nothing. Well, some of it at least.
Update: Next Day
In years past there has always been talk that Origin games require a low penalty rate. This talk is talked primarily because it is believed that penalties slow the game by interrupting the flow, just as a high mistake rate can create a slow game if advantage is squandered. There is also probably some merit to the notion that commentators want low penalty rates because they are mostly from NSW, where there is a perception that QLD forwards need high penalty counts to gain time to rest. So you may understand my slight bewilderment when Buderus claimed last night that the /low/ penalty rate played into the hands of the Queensland forwards who were allowed to /slow/ the game down. It is true, as far as it goes; Queensland did work to slow the game, and of course they would, because they know that a slower game worked in their favour. The stadium itself, with its slick surface, demanded a more deliberate game. But more importantly, a slower game meant that opportunities have to be created, not simply seized upon in broken play and advantage time. Which leads me to my prescription for NSW.
Simply, i didn’t rate Buderus the best player for NSW because while he excelled in defense during the game and made a couple of good runs from dummy half, he didn’t have much else to offer in attack. I said last week that Buderus didn’t deserve to have his position under threat and I stand by that, but at the same time, he can’t retain his position in that side. Which means that side has to be eviscerated for Buderus to retain his position.
There are four positions that handle the ball the most in a game of rugby league – Hooker, Halfback, Five Eight and Fullback. Queensland has three players who can create attacking opportunities in those positions iii and NSW has at best oneiv . They have halfback covered, either through Kimmorley or Orford or Mullins. There are no representative-level pivots in NSW though. Anasta is getting picked by default because there is just no-one else; Gasnier might edge Anasta for the spot next year, but as far as I am concerned, the jury is out on whether Gasnier is even a good enough pivot at club level.
Which is leaving Buderus awfully exposed to pressure from Robbie Farah. Farah offers more creativity than Buderus and for a side that desperately needs creativity, that means Buderus, despite being very excellent ineed while defending, is going to find himself under a lot of pressure to retain his position.
How does he keep his position? Anasta breaking his hand was probably the savior of Buderus. NSW now needs to dig up a pivot from somewhere and lo! Lurking out on the right is someone who may just slot right in. Jamie Lyons played five eighth in English Super League and during round one for Manly so he isn’t new to the position. And the play where they sent the ball to him and then kicked back in field for Stewart indicates that the side is aware of his ability. There were moments of selfishness in last night’s game, so there are still concerns, but some benefit of the doubt should be given that he can shrug it aside with the added responsibility.
Either NSW takes a punt with Lyons at pivot, or they replace Buderus with Farah. They need the creativity.
i A Mark Coyne Special? Well, I’m glad you asked. A Mark Coyne Special is a try scored late in the game – the best are started about a second before the final hooter – to grab victory from the jaws of defeat. SO named by a magnificent Queensland centre who scored a few of them over a couple of years.
ii If it wasn’t planned, if it was spontaneous, Stewart has a bright future in Origin as a reader of play.
iii Fullbacks in their current mode don’t create opportunities, they feed off the opportunities.
iv It is my belief that Kimmorley is now spooked by the intercept pass from a few years ago and is too afraid to run to the line in Origin games. It affects his ability to create atacking opportunities
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# Queensland by seven and lightyears
Like I said, a devastating win to Queensland.
Queensland’s first half was…almost frustratingly average. They threatened every time they got in the NSW twenty metres but they needed NSW to make a mistake to get there, they just didn’t seem to have any attack at long range. NSW, on the other hand, took advantage of Queensland’s lethargy and misfortune by playing some good tight football.
They go into the sheds at halftime at 18-6, NSW well in control.
Maybe there was an interdimensional tear underneath Suncorp Stadium. I tried to look but my television doesn’t quite have resolution for me to verify if the two teams had suddenly grown goatees.
Queensland came out and suddenly – almost – everything that hadn’t quite worked out in the first half just materialised from the ethereal plane in the second. It was just magic.
NSW were hopeless in the second half, particularly in the halves again. Mullen is a good player but he is still raw and for long periods of time…well, where was he? He should have been getting assistance from Anasta, but he showed up about as often as Mullen. Anasta had a really good first half and seemed to finally understand that he needed to actually do things, but then he faded into obscurity in the second half, doing Mullen a terrible disservice. The problem for NSW, of course, is who replaces him? I don’t think there is any eligible pivots who are capable of dropping into an Origin side and giving Mullins the kind of back up he needs.
So Queensland wins 25-18, completely dominating the second half and keeping NSW scoreless. There was a remarkable statistic that went without comment by the Channel Nine commentary team, AFAIK. In the 72nd minute, after QLD had been down an interchange player for some time, they had score 19 unanswered points, and yet had used three fewer replacements. They were still in single figures, eight I think; an astonishing, practically unheard of situation. NSW had been full of talk of wearing out the older Queensland forwards, and yet Queensland had a mile of replacements up it’s sleeves in the last moments on the chance that NSW turned around their entire half.
There will be replacements for QLD, Nate Myles will be suspended for four weeks minimum for a stupid lifting tackle. There need to be replacements for NSW but I am not sure if it has to extend out of the halves. The forwards were ordinary in the second half, but they had their game plan messed up by White’s constantly bleeding nose. Haynes should be kept despite doing a Justin Hodges, coincidentally at the feet of Hodges himself.
The number one replacement though needs to be the referee who had what can only be called a bad game. By my count the Badly Wrong calls were 2-all.
- Nathan Hindmarsh didn’t ground the ball and may even have received the ball off a forward pass
- Steve Price did not receive the ball off a forward pass
- Late in the first half there was a clear 40-20 kick by NSW, but the feed was given to QLD
- Thurston dropped the ball while tackled in the Queensland half and it wasn’t noticed by the touch judge, only a dozen metres away.
Anything less than a scoreless draw is bad, anything more than 1-0 is unacceptable. A layer of sludge on the cake was a very high penalty count.
On a more personal note, D has finally broken her Origin curse. She and tWM are normally out at dancing on Origin night; they come home late in the second half and without fail have always put the mocker on – if QLD are winning, they immediately fall apart and lose. Tonight, they kept it together; mocker broken.
