Obtaining won the battle, NSW coach Ricky Stuart says the Blues now have to demonstrate they can win the war after Todd Carney stepped up to the plate to set up a State of Origin decider with a 16-12 win on Wednesday evening.
The Blues moved a single stage closer to ending Queensland’s record six-year dominance of the interstate traditional, Carney’s Origin second arriving right after a forgettable debut when he provided the spark which altered the program of the game.
Now Stuart says, the total team has to adjust the program of Origin history.
“These boys have shown they can win an Origin game, now we have to display we can win an Origin series,” Stuart stated.
“We have to show to ourselves far more than anyone else that we can win an Origin series.”
Central to that will be Carney, who was 1 of a lot of Blues heroes Robbie Farah coming up with a marathon 64 tackles and Greg Bird taking out guy of the match honours.
With his side given the benefit of a one particular-man advantage immediately after Cooper Cronk was sin-binned for denying the Blues 5-eighth an opportunity to score, Carney hit the go button to modify the match irrevocably.
Getting just booted a penalty to lock it up at six-all, Carney brushed by means of an Ashley Harrison tackle on his own 20 metre line just before locating Brett Stewart in support for his 2nd attempt of the night.
Four minutes later it was 16-six to the Blues, Jarryd Hayne cleverly kicking the ball ahead immediately after being stripped by Johnathan Thurston to full a mesmerising spell for the house side.
“You do not get a lot of opportunities in Origin,” Stuart said.
“Just the pass to Brett Stewart was a hard talent.
“He took the line on a lot more tonight.”
Just as NSW did in Origin I when Michael Jennings was spelled for ten minutes, the Maroons paid dearly for Cronk’s binning, his choice to deny Carney a near particular 6 points instead becoming twelve by the time he returned.
Queensland captain Cameron Smith conceded Cronk’s stint off the area was pivotal.
“We struggled when Cooper got put in the sin-bin,” he explained.
“They scored two tries and we couldn’t recover … we had a great deal of area position in the 2nd half but unfortunately we could not get the win and which is one particular-all and we’ll go back to Brisbane for the decider.
Cronk did his finest to make amends with a brilliant kick-chase on his return which secured a repeat set for the Maroons, and then virtually like clockwork, Queensland started their late charge.
Two straight sets had been repelled by the Blues but a third was past them, Darius Boyd tapping back a Thurston bomb for Greg Inglis to stretch his Origin record tally to 14 tries.
It looked like the Maroons had broken NSW hearts when Brent Tate leapt highest to reel in a bomb in the corner, but just as he appeared set to fall over and score Jennings arrived to tap the ball out of his grasp.
The Blues had already had the life punched out of them on the stroke of halftime when immediately after a spirited opening stanza they went to the sheds trailing when Ben Hannant scored a minute prior to the break.
Stewart’s 25th-minute attempt appeared scant reward for NSW’s dominance of the opening period after Akuila Uate inexplicably allowed a bomb to bounce near his line and Boyd tapped back for Harrison to feed Hannant who dived over underneath the posts.
