State Of Origin 2025

If anyone was Mitchell Pearce-like on Wednesday night it was Nathan Cleary. For someone touted as the best player in the game he sure loves to go missing in an Origin decider. 0/3 wins. Has about 6 try assists in 16 Origins. Decent argument to pick Moses over him after getting it done in the decider in Brisbane and Game 1 this year.

Their record with Moses in the last two years is 3/3. Their record without Moses is 0/3.

Pretty strong circumstantial evidence.

 

Cleary/Moses is definitely the combination going forward, but Moses is the key. His long kicking and ball running is superb.

I thought Edwards was good in Game 1 and ineffectual in 2 and 3. Time for Pap imo. Need some real spark at the back. In reality tho, no fullback is doin much with the way the halves played. Robson did fuck all as well except tackle blokes off the ball.

 

It is actually funny that Qld only won 2 of the 6 halves played. Daley talking about needing to start much better after being down 26-6 in game 2 at halftime, and then being down by the exact same margin in game 3, is comical.

You got the sense that he, Phil Gould and a good portion of NSW wrote off the Game 2 loss as an aberration caused by the referee. Didnt seem too concerned about the horrendous goal line defence which reared its head again.

 

Agree with most of that except I think you always have to start Haas. Olakau'atu and Koloamatangi should feel very unlucky to not have featured in this series at all.

Speaking of rotations and pack composition, I wanna give a rap to Slater for finally benching Carrigan and Nanai. Our rotation worked so much better just having Loiero tackle everything (48 with 0 missed) like a traditional lock, and utilising Carrigan as a genuine prop. His output of 140m and 20 tackles in only 34 minutes vindicated those of us who thought he was playing way too many minutes and having to do way too many tackles. He's better suited as a relief prop at this level.

And I've gotta eat some humble pie about Kurt Capewell. He was actually really good, very solid without being brilliant.

 

You mean you werent impressed with Hudson Young's 8 runs for 47m? lol the best part was Cleary getting tackled on 5th (again) and watching Young at first receiver opt to kick himself rather than pass to Luai, puts in a dud grubber and then drops the ricochet all in one movement. Capped off by Yeo's wasted challenge on the play, it was satirical at that point.

 

Thats a good side and I like Martin on the bench instead of starting. His defence isnt up to it.

Latrell, Turbo and Drinkwater offer more with the pass than Tedesco/Edwards/Pap but I'm not sure they're up to it positionally and physically for various reasons. Latrell, when he's in the mood, is a different story, as he can be Hayne 2014-like sometimes.

 

It's a weird situation for NSW in a way because on the one hand the scoreline really flattered them. Factoring in To'o's consolation try in the dying seconds, or even just Holmes slipping over on the conversion, I mean they basically lost 13+ in a decider at home. That's pretty atrocious when you have the better team. On the other hand, I dont think they need many changes. Barnett and Moses should come straight back in. But it's really more of an attitude and effort thing for mine. They just didnt play hard enough, especially on their try line.

Personnel changes wont fix it if their desire to win doesnt match the opposition.

 

It'll be interesting to see what Slater does next year and the form of our outside backs. Holmes and Tualagi can fight it out for right side wing. Toia and Coates aint going anywhere. I'm not fully sold on Shibisaki just yet but his tackle breaking ability and big body helped against Crichton. Needs to work on his defence to the outside.

 

Nah Martin had a poor series with the ball but he was completely misused by Daley. The guy is an impact player at this level and should be on the bench. 2023 series proved that. Bloke was Menzies-like off the pine.