Game over for Brisbane coach Anthony Griffin and his Broncos following loss on Saturday

NORTH Queensland face the Roosters in the semi-final next weekend after sending Brisbane packing and ending Anthony Griffin’s coaching career.

NRL 1st Elimination Final - North Queensland v Brisbane

BRISBANE’S game of Russian Roulette is over – and so is Anthony Griffin’s coaching career at Red Hill.

Having dodged a bullet for the past six weeks, the Broncos finally found a loaded chamber as North Queensland ran riot to pull the trigger on Brisbane’s season on Saturday night.

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The Cowboys fired to win the Queensland elimination derby 32-20 in Townsville, leaving Griffin to digest a sloppy end to his 101-match tenure as Brisbane coach.

The hatchet job was hopelessly self-inflicted, with Brisbane woeful in the crucial opening exchanges as the Cowboys bolted to an 18-0 lead they would not surrender.

Gavin Cooper gets away from Martin Kennedy.

By halftime, a massacre loomed at 24-0.

And while the Broncos hit back to provide a minor tremor, shaving the deficit to 24-14 with three tries in seven minutes, they were left to rue a start as flat as week-old lemonade.

The night was particularly painful for props Martin Kennedy, who tore his calf, and off-contract Ben Hannant, reported in the 69th minute in what could be his final Broncos outing.

The one certainty is the curtain has fallen on Griffin, who will not be content with Brisbane’s eighth-placing after having his 2015 contract torn-up in July.

Jason Taumalolo of the Cowboys is tackled.

The Broncos travelled to Townsville knowing only one strategy would keep their season alive.

They had to start up-tempo from the first minute, dominate the ruck early, nullify Matt Scott and replicate the ambush the Cowboys executed in round nine.

Instead, the Broncos saved potentially their worst for last. Their opening 20 minutes wasn’t average, nor mediocre. It was appalling. It was so stupefyingly insipid the Broncos never gave themselves a puncher’s chance against a Cowboys side that shifted gears as seamlessly as a Ferrari.

Brisbane broke every conceivable golden rule. In finals football, the one percenters are everything.

The Broncos stand in goal waiting for a conversion.

Wherever you looked it was ugly. There were too many errors. Not enough metres. Poor cohesion on offence and in defence, the Broncos allowed Cowboys enforcer Matt Scott and his posse of big boppers to take a mortgage on the middle third.

While the Broncos were sloppy, Griffin was outcoached by his Cowboys counterpart Paul Green.

There has been a gradual improvement in the Cowboys.

On Saturday night, the structures Green has worked to implement gathered title-winning steam.

By contrast, the Broncos executed slower, were disjointed in the halves and looked off the pace for 60 minutes.

Cowboys and Broncos players push and shove.

The great shame is that Brisbane’s first-half didn’t match their second. At 24-14, they were storming home but when Michael Morgan crashed over 15 minutes from time, it represented the coup de grace.

Griffin’s four-year reign delivered three finals campaigns but since Darren Lockyer’s retirement in 2011, the club has never looked a genuine title threat.

On Saturday night, the Cowboys added an exclamation mark. Brisbane are brave but not even a brief second-half fightback could mask the reality the Broncos need more to truly rise again.

Wayne Bennett’s second coming can’t come quick enough.

NORTH QUEENSLAND 32 (G Cooper 2 K Linnett R Lui M Morgan tries J Thurston 6 goals) bt BRISBANE 20 (J Kahu 2 B Barba D Vidot tries C Parker 2 goals) at 1300SMILES Stadium. Referee: Gerard Sutton, Ben Cummins. Crowd: 25,120.