It’s coming Homer: Brutal and beautiful, this was an Origin odyssey of epic proportions

If you don’t bend, you break. For 65 minutes, Queensland didn’t bend.

Then, after an eternity stretching back 19 years plus those 65 minutes, Jarome Luai and Mitchell Moses broke them. Two playmakers who had been maligned, to put it politely, on both sides of the border, defeated doubt itself.

Luai cracked the Maroon wall with his speed to put Bradman Best away. Moments later, Moses parted the middle defence and Queensland came apart like a windscreen.

And that was that. As they had in 1994 and 2005, NSW won a State of Origin decider in Brisbane. Luai and Moses were not the only ones to silence the hate. Michael Maguire, that careworn grizzled debutant, can bring back the trophy that has eluded a generation of coaches. He won’t bother waiting for the apologies; he wouldn’t have time to read them all.

Luai and Moses put on the only tries of the game. Maguire masterminded the campaign. It’s unfair to single out individuals because all 17 Blues players made a contribution and so did Haumole Olakau’atu, who was watching from the seats.

It was that kind of night. Most of the time it was hard to tell if this was an Origin decider or something a bit rougher like a Republican Party convention. The schoolyard chant was on – “Fight! Fight! Fight!” – and Lang Park was soon looking like one of those popular combat sports videos where the two contestants knock each other out and everyone goes home. Except a draw was not an option and nobody was allowed to leave.

NSW celebrate their series win.Credit: Getty Images

In the pre-match froth, a lot was made of the importance of the opening exchanges, which, supposedly, would set the tone and determine the result.

Payne Haas and NSW won the first collisions, and only a Daly Cherry-Evans ankle tap stopped Best from scoring in the first minute. So maybe NSW did gain the advantage. But it soon became clear that the traditional softening-up period, as the late David Morrow might have called it, kept going, going, going, and remarkably neither team was gone. Half an hour had passed and we were still in the traditional softening-up period, still in the opening earthquake, and it was still 0-0.

Then it was on, literally, for young and old and others too. A scuffle turned into a pile-on and Queensland’s Jeremiah Nanai was sin-binned for escalating matters. So did Cameron Murray, and he was sin-binned too … only Murray had been watching from the reserves bench at the time, so the Blues had to nominate a player (the unlucky Mitch Barnett) to serve Murray’s time.

And if that was not enough, Olakau’atu, one of the NSW squad watching in his civvies, was also sent away to watch the rest of the game on TV. Even the ball-kids were charging in with intent. Why I oughta!

Halfback Mitchell Moses scores for NSW.Credit: Getty Images

Aggression was getting the better of every player until Spencer Leniu’s overheating cost his team points. Queensland’s Valentine Holmes kicked the penalty goal in the closing seconds of the first half. Until then, Origin III had been shaping up as the most exciting scoreless draw since the Matildas played France.

The second half provided more of the same crash, bang and wallop. Many will say rugby league is a crude and brutal sport, but there was beauty in the crudeness and Homeric poetry in the brutality. This game showcased the qualities that make Origin different from the rest of rugby league. You don’t need high scores and try-arrhoea to make the highest form of sporting entertainment. Defence is the best form of defence, as it has been since the origin of Origin, and the defence from both teams – not just the muscle but the anticipation, the team cohesion and the final desperation – will be remembered and glorified and all the things the game does to celebrate its best.

There was also a degree of honesty that workaday rugby league can lack. Since the urgency of concussion injuries came into the game, the new rules have been exploited by players pretending to be hurt when brushed in the head. In this Origin encounter, there was no pretending, no milking, no play-acting. NSW and Queensland agree on nothing else, but there was an admirable unspoken pact in this game that unless a player was hit in the head with force, he would not feign injury.

Angus Crichton was man of the series and he signed off by saying “it’s coming home”. Not sure everyone will agree with that, but for the next year, the shield lives south of the Tweed. Maguire might even keep it under his bed. He won’t give it back without a fight.

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