Wests Tigers beat North Queensland Cowboys on a wet and wild Friday night

ON a wet and miserable night at Leichhardt, they celebrated like it was the 2005 grand final all over again.

ON a wet and miserable night at Leichhardt, they celebrated like it was the 2005 grand final all over again.

But for inspirational skipper Robbie Farah, last night's thrilling 22-20 win over the Cowboys felt more like the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders.

All season, Farah has played his guts out for the Tigers.

But after finally breaking the record seven-match losing streak last night, Farah offered up a piece of his heart.

Asked how it felt to be heading into Origin camp on Monday after a win, he said: "To be honest, I have been thinking about it all week, even though we had this game.

"Even though I have been happy with my form for the whole year, you kind of start to doubt yourself and I found in the last couple of weeks I started to doubt if I was going as good as I thought."

But last night you couldn't question his effort, nor that of any of his teammates.

Let's leave the controversy surrounding the video refereeing decisions for a moment and look at what this win means for a club that has been under the pump all year.

Aaron Woods, Adam Blair, Benji Marshall.

They all chipped in their own way. In the end it was a spectacular try to 19-year-old winger David Nofoaluma that proved the difference in the dying minutes but there were stories all over the park - and the good and bad of it all depended on who you support.

If you were a Cowboys fan you have every right to be blowing up today - which is what you would imagine Neil Henry will be doing with referees boss Daniel Anderson after four contentious video refereeing decisions.

But for the Tigers it was about relief.

Woods busted his gut up front in a late bid for Origin inclusion while Blair stepped up after a week of intense criticism. Even before the game Blair copped it from his own crowd when the Leichhardt faithful booed him as the ground announcer read out the teams. But after the final hooter sounded you couldn't silence the cheers.

And you had to feel happy for Mick Potter. Asked how he felt at full-time, Potter dead-panned like he was completely drained of emotion.

"I was relieved but I was real happy for the players," he said. "It was a real determined effort. I was happy for them and happy for the crowd and relieved for myself."

And he reckons it was the type of win that could change their season. They have the bye next weekend and the Panthers follow Origin on Sunday week.

"It could launch us the other way where we could win a few on the back of that," he said. "If we can keep that team work and that want. You can't buy that sort of stuff. It is something that is either there or it is not and it was there tonight. The momentum from that will be fantastic."

As for his captain, he couldn't praise him enough.

"I think he has probably done 60-odd tackles," Potter said of Farah. "He carried the ball, kicked the ball. He would be the best hooker in the game. The way he is playing is phenomenal. He is going to be great for NSW. His work rate, you can't buy that."

For the Cowboys Johnathan Thurston couldn't have done more to get his team home, playing a hand in two tries and having two contentious decisions turned back by the video referee. All up, there were four that will come under scrutiny with the video referee over-ruling the on field referee on three occasions.

The whole point of getting rid of the benefit of the doubt call was to empower the on-field referee to make a decision.

"We owed it to the fans," victorious skipper Farah said.

"They stuck solid even though we have been pretty disappointing in the last few months.

"They showed up tonight in the pouring rain and got us home in the end."