After losing last year’s State of Origin series-opener, Brad Fittler stated (perhaps self-evidently) that his New South Wales side simply had to make it happen in game two. “We can’t sit back and wait,” he said. “The video review of game one we did earlier this week showed that we were just waiting for things to happen in Brisbane. It won’t happen in Perth.”
It did not happen in Perth. The Blues battered the Maroons 38-6 at Optus Stadium. Then they went to ANZ Stadium, won 26-20 and emerged 2-1 series victors. The scoreline of that 2019 game-one loss at Suncorp Stadium read 18-14. Dane Gagai had inspired a second-half comeback as the Blues toiled to get out of their own half. See where this is going? Same scoreline. Similar – albeit not identical – turn of events.
After last week’s 2020 series-opening 18-14 loss at Adelaide Oval, Fittler used different words to the same effect. “It actually gives us a good chance to have a bit of an attitude adjustment and realise that there’s a series now, ready to go,” he said. “We will just see what sort of character we’re made of.”
It will be up to a clairvoyant to decide if such symmetry means anything ominous for the Maroons or is only pure, insignificant chance. If the new-age Fittler will “earthwalk” his team from a 1-0 disadvantage to a third successive series triumph, or whether the Blues camp discover the hard way that barefoot strolls designed to soak up the soil’s nutrients will not stop you falling face flat in the mud.
Of course, there are mitigating factors – and big ones at that. Boyd Cordner’s prudent decision to rule himself out of the rest of the series after yet another concussion scare leaves a major void in the second row and transfers a heap of pressure on to the shoulders of the stand-in captain James Tedesco. It will be the first Origin match since 2016 that Cordner has not captained the side.
Cameron Murray is gone too with a hamstring injury, and the alien nature of a condensed post-season series presents unique challenges for both teams, including demanding seven-day turnarounds already pushing some bodies to the brink. But this series will not be marked by a Covid-19 asterisk just because it is unique. The playing field is fair. Wayne Bennett fielded eight Queensland debutants, the most since Bennett himself picked 10 rookies for the 2001 opener. One of them, AJ Brimson, is out for the series with a foot injury. Christian Welch is also sidelined with concussion.
Likewise, there is nothing unusual about the past week’s annual selection witch hunt, which ended with Luke Keary burned at the stake (well, dropped to the reserves). Cody Walker, dropped last year for game two, gets his chance at five-eighth. The forward pack and bench have also been refurbished, with Angus Crichton to start in the second row for Cordner, and Payne Haas at prop, while Dale Finucane has been recalled and Isaah Yeo and Nathan Brown are in line to make debuts.
The point is that accusations of Blues complacency mean nothing different this year than they would any other, and a 10-0 half-time lead does not turn into an 18-14 loss on its own. However, evidence thus far in the Fittler era – admittedly, it has not been long – suggests that usually, when the going gets a bit lax, an on-field humbling is followed with a statement. Superiority is re-announced, sometimes brutally so. Sometimes in the form of a 32-point thrashing.
Bennett, despite not being in the chair last year, will know this. So too will those remaining from that 2019 squad. Captain Daly Cherry-Evans, who has twice lost to NSW at ANZ Stadium including last year’s game-three 26-20 defeat, is one of them.
“They’re going to be a lot hungrier, I dare say they’ll be an improved side,” Cherry-Evans said. “We need to certainly take our game to another level. What we did in game one won’t be enough to win game two, or game three. We’re aware of that and we’ve been trying to work on that during the week.”
Should the Maroons sharpen themselves up enough to have the edge on Wednesday night at Olympic Park, they will join a sizeable club – Origin I winners have gone on to claim 27 of the 38 series since the three-game format was introduced in 1982.
Yet history only forms part of the picture, as NSW proved last year. And statistics are just for journalists, as many a coach will insist. The result of game two can be shoehorned into any available narrative. But, in the end, even if numbers mean nothing and identical scorelines are serendipitous, vengeance is no accident, and the Blues will not be so inviting this time.
