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Queensland captain Cameron Munster learned life is never perfect when his father died at age 58 on the weekend, but in one of the great State of Origin performances his teammates delivered a just about flawless display in Wednesday’s decider, securing the shield for 2025 in a 24-12 victory.
The Maroons completed all 21 sets in an extraordinary first stanza, scoring three tries and kicking four-from-four to secure a 20-0 lead. Desperate defence held out the Blues for much of the second, allowing the Maroons to escape from Homebush with the shield in front of 80,256 mostly Blues fans hushed by the spectacle.
A NSW try from Stephen Crichton midway through the second half for a moment heightened the tension and gave the local fans hope. But when Maroons halfback Tom Dearden crossed with five minutes to go, the northerners could afford to celebrate. Billy Slater and his coaching staff exploded in euphoria and the celebrations continued on the sidelines, even as the Blues recorded a consolation score in the dying stages.
Munster thanked the rugby league community for their well wishes after the final whistle, and paid credit to his teammates. “The stars aligned tonight for me,” he said. “[I’m] forever grateful, and I just want to say thank you to everyone.”
The Blues had claimed they would be able to handle adversity better after they were jumped by the Maroons in the opening half in Perth. What played out in Sydney however was largely the same script, and Laurie Daley’s side looked disjointed and ineffective for most of the contest.
A distraught Blues halfback Nathan Cleary, who is now none-from-three in Origin deciders, said he was shattered. “It just wasn’t good enough, and at the end of the day, we probably didn’t react well enough to their rushing defence, and they saved tries, they scrambled, and we struggled to do that.”
As the Maroons piled on the points in the first 40, a capacity crowd at Accor Stadium was shocked by what they were witnessing. The Blues were heavily favoured and unchanged from Perth in Game 2, when they were unlucky not to win the shield in the dying stages.
In that match, the Blues surged back from 20 points down to lose by two, ultimately foiled by a gallant Maroons’ defensive display. All the rhetoric from the Blues camp this week was how they would adjust better if things went the same way. What eventuated was barely believable.
Zac Lomax’s ineffective tackle on the Maroons rookie Gehamat Shibasaki on a Queensland sweep down the left proved costly when the centre slipped the ball onto Xavier Coates for the first try midway through the first half.
The match appeared to be hanging in the balance 10 minutes later when Queensland’s other centre Robert Toia was being dragged towards the sideline, which would have given NSW an attacking set and a chance to hit back. But miraculously the rookie released the ball inside, and it found its way to a streaking Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow who glided through three Blues and found Dearden inside for the second try.
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The third came just before the half-time whistle, and after the impressive Dearden snuck his nose through the Blues’ line, Harry Grant burrowed his way over on the ensuing tackle, taking three defenders and bouncing off the right goalpost. The great white stick swung left and right in the cool Sydney night as if to emphasise the earth-shattering display.
The series victory is the third in four years for coach Billy Slater. After the blip in the decider in the Brisbane last year, the 42-year-old has now masterminded a trio of victories against the Blues to reassert his reputation as rugby league’s best emerging coach.
This performance won’t quickly be forgotten however. Queensland had never won a series by coming back to win two games away from Brisbane, and after the one-sided defeat in Game 1 few had thought the Maroons still had a chance. For Slater to engineer the series victory having made the extraordinary call to axe captain Daly Cherry-Evans after the first match only adds to the legend.
Munster was effective without being the star in a disciplined, committed team performance. Instead it was his halves partner Dearden who was named man of the match. “Any time you get to pull on the Maroons jersey, it’s the greatest feeling and the greatest honour,” Dearden said. “And you get pretty nervous coming into these games, but to be honest, I looked at my halves partner in Cameron Munster, and he just makes you feel so comfortable.”
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