NRL 2006 – State of Origin III Live Blogging

Yes folks! Guusball is over and back to the real thing. Melbourne hosts the third State of Origin with the series at one game a piece. Will we be marvelling the mighty magic of the Maroons? Or will be saying bravo as the Blues return to their belligerent best? The beer is cold and the laptop warm so let’s get it on.

Pre Game

Well, David and Camilla seem to be having some issues in the house and..sorry..where is the clicker thingy…sweet jumping jehovah! Has Dermot Brereton had plastic surgery? Ahhh, there is Sterlo. This is more like it.

Why can’t I remember the images we are supposed to remember forever?

What’s this jazz stuff? We want Tina back!

One postive of global warming is that it may end such shows as Torvil and Dean’s Humilating B-Grade Stars on Ice.

Woo hoo! The Caltex Vortex Try Tracker is back.

Petrol bowser rip offs and Australia’s raunchiest beauty queen. Oh the humanity!

Heh heh. Good joke by Matty Johns about how the Telstra Dome roof is playing havoc with the pre-game parachutists.

Here come the teams!

Some boos for the blues but otherwise the crowd reaction seems evenly split.

Please be upstanding for the ritual mangling of the National Anthem

Game on!

First Half

NSW to kick off.

2 minute: First penalty to NSW. Send Tate off for the elbow as well. Been doing it all night.

5th minute: Bugger me. Gasnier can kick.

6th minute: Great work by QLD but Hindmarsh saves the day!

10th minute: A great bust by Tate and then a kick from Thurston finds Mogg. Close decision. Waiting…

10th minute: A try to QLD!

11th minute: Still 4 nil as Shci…Schi…Sich..Clinton misses with the kick.

15th minute: Thurston flops and NSW get a penalty.

23rd minute: QLD look better in attack but NSW defense is holding well

GURU!!!!!!

27th minute: Eric Grothe takes an intercept and races the length of the field to score. His first origin try and just what we needed. Hodgson misses the conversion

27th minute: 4 all.

37th minute: QLD are looking tired. NSW have one more chance to try and put on points

Half Time: QLD 4 NSW 4.

Absorbing 1st half.QLD looked the better side for the first 26 minutes but Grothe’s try seemed to turn the game around. QLD looked soft up the middle and NSW unlucky not have grabbed a further try.

For NSW, Money Bags Gaz is not a 5/8. Hodgson has been playing well in both the 5/8 and fullback role. The forward pack has stepped up with O’Meley playing well off the bench and Gallen having a great first game.

Tate has been dangerous in attack and solid in defense for QLD. Thurston has seemed a little off his game but still dangerous in attack.

The scoreline is a good reflection of this tight game. Hard to predict the 2nd half but I’d say it may turn on some freakish luck as did the first half.

2nd Half

They’re back for the deciding 40 minutes. What odds for a tied score at full time?

Oh no! Grothe drops the ball and Carrol kcks through to score. Awaiting the video ref.

40th minute: Hah! Carrol denied and a penalty to NSW

46th minute: King is in! NSW 8 -4

47th minute: 10 -4 to NSW. Some may say that Queensland were at the end of a rough decision. I call it justice.

Grothe is in for his 2nd. Awaiting the video ref.

49th minute: Video ref inexplicably gives the try to Grothe after an obvious knock on by Hodgson. I want NSW to wine but not via dodgy refereeing.

50th minute: Hodgson misses so 14 -4 to NSW.

58th minute: Video ref again on a possible try to Cooper. He gets it right and still 14-4 to NSW

61st minute: Great bust by QLD and a great tackle on Tate from Hodgson. Thurston kick is played dead by NSW

69th minute: Great raid by NSW and then counter by QLD. Good football by everyone. Hope Tahu is ok. Needed for the Eels against the Knights on Saturday.

71st minute: Tate scores a great try for QLD. Clinton converts and the score if 14-10. Anyone’s game.

BLOODY HELL! Lockyer freakishly intercepts to score under the post.

75th minute: Clinton converts and the score is 16-14 to QLD!

77th minute: NSW carry the fullback back into ingoal only to be penalised!

79th minute: NSW get the ball back from the line drop out but knock on and scrum to QLD.

Full Time: QLD win 16-14! A great 2nd half fightback brings them the series. NSW are devastated and so am I. But what a game. Melbourne got the best game of the series. QLDers are invited to gloat in the comments for the post game analysis.

This entry was posted in Sport-general. Bookmark the permalink.
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

15 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
avocadia
17 years ago

I won’t gloat because for a good twenty minutes I was sure the NSW contingent of the Australian selectors would be pushing for the Video Referee to be given Man of the Match. Anybody who had anything critical to say about a Spanish referee last week would want to have something critical to say about the video referee, because those was an appaling two decisions. A good measure of how appaling they were was that Phil Gould was actually on the side of Light.
On a sidenote, as they were announcing the dignitaries at the trophy awarding, the crowd were very forward in booing Mr Howard.

Shaun
17 years ago

No, I’d hate it for NSW to have won on top of those decisions. It would have been a hollow victory.

Ken Parish
Admin
17 years ago

The disallowed Qld try by Carroll was a try, but the NSW try where they reckoned Hodgson knocked on was also a try (Hodgson didn’t touch the ball with his hands or arms, it bounced off his gut, which isn’t a knock-on). So justice was done in the end. Qld deserved to win, and the video ref didn’t affect the result as it turned out. But I agree that a video ref isn’t a magic answer. Nevertheless the soccer mob certainly need to do something to reduce the number of games decided by appalling refereeing decisions and/or dying swan acts by attacking players in the penalty area. There must be a happy medium between excessive reliance on video ref decisions and none at all.

vee
vee
17 years ago

Well I regretfully got 3/3 in my origin tips.

Was Tate onside with his try? 9 never replayed it. My conclusion: that’s the worst scripted origin I’ve ever seen.

Talk about duplicitous penalties though, Rabs calls human chair up one end and its play on, happens up the other end and its a penalty.

On another league note I agree with Wally Lewis what’s with the referee boss handing out interpretations of rules all the time, if you can interpret within what’s written in black and white in the rule book then thats it. None of this dominant and surrender tackles, a forward pass is a forward pass, is it a knock on if it comes of the forearms or if its deemed to be played at? What does the black and white rule book say?

avocadia
17 years ago

The Mogg try was dodgy in the extreme and the best you can say is possibly a mumbled “benefitoofthedoubt…”. But it seemed pretty clear to me on the replay that it came off Hodgson’s stomach and onto then his hand. Perhaps I was making the same sin as the video ref in the Carroll try and looking too hard.

Shaun
17 years ago

There should be Ken but if you find that medium the nature of not using video evidence will mean endless discussion of why wasn’t the video ref used for certain instances.

Richard Phillipps
Richard Phillipps
17 years ago

I am not sure about video refs. the point about soccer (sorry football) is that it is a cruel game, and part of its poignancy comes from the shattered hopes lying in its path. Apparently the FIFA view is that football is for humans, not machines, and that mechanistic perfection is therefore to be avoided.

Rafe
17 years ago

The referee’s mistakes probably came out even. NSW paid for some sloppy play the balls.

Several players could have done with longer sprigs, don’t they have that option when the going is a bit greasy?

I thought the Blues were clear winners in the National Anthem, many of them gave the appearance of actually knowing the words.

avocadia
17 years ago

I tend to think that league just doesn’t move fast enough to warrant a video referee. The video ref seems to lead to more dodgy decisions than it is worth – Mogg and Carroll tonight, Billy Slater a few years back, Billy Slater the year before that.

Shaun
17 years ago

Mogg’s try was close but ‘benefit of the doubt’ was probably deserved though the rule is never consistently applied. I’d like to see Grothe’s second try again before agreeing or disagreeing Ken.

Good point vee about the rule book. I don’t mind the idea of interpretations but the constant changing is ridiculous.

And just want to point out my prediction:
“Hard to predict the 2nd half but I’d say it may turn on some freakish luck as did the first half.” Lockyer’s intercept was just that.

All in all another chapter of Origin folklore as been written.

Shaun
17 years ago

And where was the Calteksh Vortexsh Try Tracker at halftime? I don’t think Gould brought it out.

Brian Bahnisch
Brian Bahnisch
17 years ago

Rafe, I had the botched refereeing decisions as 5-1 against Qld. btw the Thurston flop in the 15th minute wasn’t a flop. The first Qld tackler had rolled clear leaving Hodgson entitled to get up and run, which he would have done.

On the Hodgson knock-on, they probably gave him the benefit of the doubt but Warren Ryan said that if the guy can’t catch the ball and it bounces off his gut he shouldn’t get an advantage out of it.

But the best Origin matches are decided by a centimetre here or there and this was one of them.

Amanda
17 years ago

I really must stop going to bed early in these matches. Damn those 4am starts.

vee
vee
17 years ago

On the Hodgson knock on, it depends which rule was applied: if you play at the ball and it goes forward its a knock on or its only a knockon if it comes off the forearms. As for the Thurston flop, it was one. I forget who it was now but QLD’s early no-try in the first half was a try.

Referee, two touch judges, video ref, 1,2,3,4 that should be their order of importance. If the ref can’t see and the touch judge is unsure – go to the video ref – its that simple, at least on potential tries.

I have no qualms with the video ref going back to check on dirty plays.

Peter
Peter
17 years ago

Can someone please explian to me what “the Human Chair” is?

I heard Rabs go on about bieng manhandled in the human chair in the Knight Manly game on Friday night