State of Origin 2016: NSW could learn a thing or two from Cronulla’s defeat of North Queensland

IT has been a decade of pain for NSW so if you’re wondering why should you watch Origin anyway, a ray of hope comes from an unlikely source, writes RICHARD HINDS.

Paul Gallen shows Johnathan Thurston can be beaten.

THEY say it’s the hope that kills you. But in the case of another Blues defeat on Wednesday night the coroner will this time have to look for a different cause of death.

This is the Origin series in which the reckless optimism of previous years is missing. Where all hope has been abandoned and NSW — the population and possibly the team itself — seems grimly resigned to its fate.

It is just two years since Paul Gallen’s drought-breakers proved The Unbeatables were The Defeatables.

Queensland was supposed to fall apart when their streak was broken. Veteran superstars would succumb to old age, Mal Meninga would return to politics and a new era of Blues’ supremacy — OK, we would have settled for Blues’ equality — would begin.

Instead Queensland’s cold hands have reached from the grave and inflicted more misery. Like Bill Murray’s waking to sound of I’ve Got You Babe in Groundhog Day, there is a maddening sense of deja vu.

Does NSW have to go through this again, again?

Yes, game one was close. But if the Blues can’t even get Wade Graham cleared by what the chippiest Queenslanders sneeringly call the “New South Wales judiciary’’, what hope do they have of beating the lingering Queensland legends on their own dung heap?

As always, you hopefully wonder if Queensland will be lulled into a false sense of security. Suncorp Stadium was not sold out late last week — an indication bloated Queenslanders are bored with winning? Or, more likely, just the understandable response of fans reluctant to pay big money to see a show when they already know the ending.

Now haunted by Tommy Raudonikis and the ghosts of Origin past, Laurie Daley has chosen to “pick and stick’’. To some a strong expression of faith, to others the definition of insanity — doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

Phil Gould suggests we need to “somehow wipe our players’ memories of everything that has happened in State of Origin prior to game one 2016.’’ And when you’ve done that Gus, can you wipe my bookmaker’s memory of all the bets I’ve placed in the past week?

Paul Gallen shows Johnathan Thurston can be beaten.

So having provided good reasons to clean the fish tank or start preparing your tax return on Wednesday night, why should you watch Origin anyway? The best ray of hope comes from a once unlikely source: Cronulla.

The Sharks’ victory over North Queensland last Monday night proved Johnathan Thurston occasionally loses something other than a hotel room game of Fifa16.

Yes, it was at Shark Park. Yes, it came at the cost of Graham’s Origin debut. Yes, Thurston tends to be even harder to stop when surrounded by Queensland teammates who spend their spare time posing for the statues that will commemorate their brilliant careers.

But there is a laudable spirit about the Sharks this season exemplified by the number of close games they have won. Captain Paul Gallen, James Maloney and the muscular Andrew Fifita bring a healthy slice of Cronulla DNA to the Blues.

Fifita’s game one cameo was instructive. That he threw himself at the Maroons’ line furiously with his very first carry was the sign of a man who, like Gallen, Aaron Woods, Greg Bird and David Klemmer, won’t die wondering.

Andrew Fifita can be the wrecking ball NSW need.

We bemoaned the poor standard of the first game which was made to look even worse by the broadcaster’s hyperbolic build-up. At 6-4 we were left wondering when they would play the second set.

But as the Blues proved when they were on the right side of the same score line in 2014, unsightly games remain the ones they are most likely to win. If Origin becomes an exhibition of the game’s greatest skills, then the game’s greatest players will shine. And, right now, the majority of those players still wear maroon.

The prospect of a series-revitalising NSW victory seems farfetched. But if Gallen, Woods, Bird, Fifita and Klemmer throw themselves relentlessly into the fray, and Maloney and Adam Reynolds this time click, and Matt Moylan is better under the high ball and ... nah, sorry, those memories are still too fresh. Queensland will probably win anyway.

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