Cowboys honour fallen King Henry

RUGBY League honouring their fallen "King" was the emotional surge that pushed North Queensland to their best win of the season.

RUGBY League honouring their fallen "King" was the emotional surge that pushed North Queensland to their best win of the season.

Veteran prop Ashton Sims revealed the turmoil surrounding his good friend and coach, the dethroned Neil Henry, steeled the Cowboys to turn their shock first half lead over table-topping South Sydney into a brilliant victory.

The Cowboys have lost three games this season by just two points and another two games by just four points.

In their previous match against the Brisbane Broncos they led with six minutes to go until Justin Hodges exposed flat-footed defence to steal victory.

Players were understandably nervous that the Rabbitohs would launch a comeback and they would fail to hold on to a lead again, but on the back of standout performances from their forward pack the Cowboys posted a 30-12 win.

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Their increase in determination came after Henry's contract was terminated last Sunday.

That same day the club lost Graham Murray to a heart attack, the coach who took them to a grand final in 2005.While Sims' front-row cohort Matt Scott played down talk of performing for Henry or Murray, Sims revealed the team lifted in their honour.

Especially when they had two tries disallowed early in the second half and were clinging on to a 14-0 lead.

"It's been a really emotional week," Sims said.

"Everyone's got a really good relationship with King and just the emotion of that probably got us through and we dug deep and put a good score on a good team.

"After those two (disallowed) tries, maybe earlier in the year we would have dropped our heads, but we actually got excited about it and it was really good.

"Johnno and Matty Scott and Tariq were really talking us up out there and that got us through a pretty tough period.

"They're a good team and I think we played our best game this year."

The Sims brothers, Ashton and Tariq, outperformed their much hyped rivals the Burgess boys in Sam, George and Thomas.

Tariq scored a runaway try in the opening half that resembled his 2011 Dally M rookie of the year form, while Ashton made more tackles than any prop on the field.

Yet it was James Tamou who led the pack, with his best performance of the year. 

"I thought both our front rowers were excellent. Matty has been like that all year, he's something else, and Jimmy really stepped up again," Ashton Sims said.

"I don't think he's even been playing that bad.

"I know he puts a big emphasis on himself and he marks himself pretty hard, but I think he's been going good and on Saturday I think he went to another level again."

The Cowboys must win their remaining five games to have a chance of making the finals, starting with the Panthers in Penrith this Sunday.

Sims admitted their victory over the Rabbitohs came too late in the season for them to mount a premiership challenge.

"In all honestly we're probably about 10, 14 rounds too late, but we're doing it. I don't want to beat it to death, but we're a mathematical chance and that's what we're holding on to," he said.