THERE are certain things you’re supposed to say when people ask what makes you proud of your home state. Nice things like the shimmering Harbour, the Opera House, the SCG or the Olympics.

I would trade them all for the bloodied grin that Brett White gave Justin Hodges in the moments after knocking out Steve Price on Wednesday night.
As the flashy Hodges ranted about payback, positioning himself behind bigger teammates, White simply poked out his bloodied tongue and smiled, mocking Hodges for the pea-hearted, adolescent sook that he is.

At that moment, NSW hearts swelled with pride. Until then, we had almost forgotten the things that make the Premier state better than Queensland. Like having a first-world economy and houses made from bricks. 
When Brett White landed that magnificent right cross, he struck a blow for every NSW fan who’s been bailed up in a pub by a pissed, red-headed Queenslander dribbling on about their superior passion and commitment to Origin.
Columnist and online phenomenon Phil Rothfield started a near-riot yesterday when he claimed the game was disgraced by what happened at Suncorp Stadium. I say what happened on Wednesday night could well be rugby league’s salvation.
For 80 minutes, the nightclub brawls, group sex scandals and defecations in corridors were forgotten and the majestic speed, skill and brutality of the game brought into focus.
Who can forget the sight of Greg Inglis repeatedly brushing off David Williams like a Mormon on his doorstep? And just when it seemed Inglis would go the length of the field after another raid down the left side, along came little old Brett Kimmorley to hammer him into touch.
There were cheap shots, but none of them involved Brett White. Without the slightest irony, Hodges declared after the game that NSW lock Trent Waterhouse had committed a “dog act” by rushing in to restrain Price. As it turned out, Waterhouse was too late and Price slumped into his arms, his arms flickering like an old dog daydreaming in the sun.
Waterhouse was sent off for being third man in. White stayed. God I love rugby league.
His younger teammates were already talking revenge yesterday, but Price has been around long enough to know that if you stand toe to toe with an opponent in Origin, then you take your chances. He threw some, White threw more and Price copped one right on the button. End of story.
In a far worse incident than the White-Price fight, Johnathan Thurston kicked David Williams in the face, fracturing his cheekbone, after Williams crossed the line in the 34th minute. If it was accidental, Thurston wasn’t exactly contrite. When Blues captain Kurt Gidley told the referee: “He kicked him in the head,” Thurston shot back: “Shut up you spastic.”
If there was a coward on the field, it was Hodges. He spent the night calling opposition players out, dragging his finger across his throat in murderous gestures, inciting the violence but never wanting to put his own body on the line.
When Queensland went looking to avenge Price in the last two minutes, it was Hodges who called on Darren Lockyer to put the ball in the air on the first tackle after a penalty.
Brave Hodges was the first there to put the shoulder into the defenceless fullback Gidley, a soft target the Queenslanders had decided to use to save face in front of their seething fans.
When the Blues backrower Ben Creagh came in to support Gidley and give Hodges a shove, he too was sent from the field.
In Origin as in life, there are those who mouth off and those who get the job done. As Hodges yapped away like a CWA lady, the NSW enforcer Brett White held his bloodied tongue.
His work was done the moment the Medicab carrying his opposition front rower left the field.

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18 comments

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    • RT says:

      06:42am | 17/07/09

      I didn’t think the fighting at the end of the game did anything for the game but I expect to be in the minority in the testosterone filled atmosphere caused by men fighting. If NRL wants to hold its place as a top sport then fighting in marquee games has no place. Those involved should have been hit with long suspensions but instead, the NRL seems to be saying, that’s OK, the crowd and the viewers loved it.

      In fact the crowd was at such a pitch that it’s lucky some of them didn’t jump the fence and get involved in the brawl. It was only a moment away from happening and it would have been really hard to stop. NSW players could have been badly bashed by thugs from the crowd.  Would those like you, Luke, revelling in the player violence, have been happy with that?

      The ref should have stopped the game when Price was knocked out with only a couple of minutes left. The ref would have been to blame had the violence become out of control. He should be suspended too.

    • Rob M says:

      07:32am | 17/07/09

      If RL fans and ‘journalists’ were being completely honest with themselves, they’d admit that the game has very little to offer without a bit of mindless toe-to-toe biff. With full-time professionalism, all you now have is a bunch of highly-tuned, gym-pumped, cloned units running into each other over and over and over again, with a obligatory shortarse with no neck booting the ball away every 5 tackles. There are very few characters in the game anymore and little variety in style of play. Matt Johns was right, even if he had to use his lame “comic character” to say it: bring back the biff.

    • Matty H says:

      08:17am | 17/07/09

      Four-nil, Luke, Four-nil.

    • RT says:

      08:52am | 17/07/09

      Yeah, that’s great, Rob M. I’d say take it further: bring back the biff and forget about the ball. Just put the ‘players’ in an arena with lions and give them spears etc.  ‘This gladiators contest brought to you by Lion Bitter’. That would cure the boredom you seem to be suffering from, wouldn’t it?

    • Coxie says:

      09:05am | 17/07/09

      Thuggery by any other name is still THUGGERY, which is all the stupid game promotes. Some miscall it ‘football’ but, rightly, it is in a league of its own.

    • Dave says:

      10:24am | 17/07/09

      yep that breathed life back into a sport that only attracrted 80000 to the game before. The game is booming

    • C.L. says:

      12:27pm | 17/07/09

      There’s something truly heroic about taking joy in New South Wales’ history-making fourth consecutive series loss in the State of Origin. John Howard still had more than two years to go as Prime Minister when they last won the competition. Perhaps the Blues could send up their netball team next year.

    • pete m says:

      12:27pm | 17/07/09

      my kids will never play it

      glad I missed those last few minutes - what a joke to be proud of it.

      You should be ashamed of yourself.

    • ANDIKA says:

      12:48pm | 17/07/09

      I’m a QLDer and I was at the game. I thought the two refs were both shithouse and had they taken more control early in the game, the game may not have deteriorated the way it did in the second half.
      Both sides had try’s that weren’t trys and as for the 10 metre rule, that when out the window (At least the refs were consistent on policing the 10 metre rule – they didn’t bother).
      I have no problem with two blokes squaring up either – Price and White but I think Justin Poore is a lowlife sack of s… for lift and then dropping the head of Steve Price while he was concussed. If anyone should be hammered it should be him.
      Tonight the NRL world will also come to realise that QLD is the true centre of the NRL universe when suncorp again will be packed to capacity for the double header. The Bulldogs should be congratulated for moving their home game and the Titans should be too for being such good sports and agreeing to the game.
      Go the Titans

    • ANDIKA says:

      12:53pm | 17/07/09

      Re Coxie @ 905am and the rest of the soft options

      Stick to Netball and Croquet

    • Mark says:

      01:22pm | 17/07/09

      Being proud of this kind of crap just gives ammunition to those who call the game “thugby”. What they need to do is hand long, long suspensions to those who commit acts of thuggery in the game. Not small stuff that results from players getting hyped up on the field, but certainly some long suspensions should have come out of the last game. Rugby league offficials continue to disappoint.

      BTW, this article was crap.

    • Al says:

      02:04pm | 17/07/09

      Bring back the biff because that made league tick commercially 25 years ago? As a business model, it’s the equivalent of encouraging league players to take off their pants and behave like the props of the 80s.
      Few will separate the mid-game stink and the off-field poo.
      Ask yourself how many parents watched the donneybrook and were convinced to let their young kids play league.
      The game is going nowhere.

    • Mondo Rock says:

      02:12pm | 17/07/09

      Here here Luke.

      Football is a game for men, not for the whining babies complaining that they had to watch a Queenslander get his cane-toad lights punched out.  If they want a nice little girly game to watch there’s always AFL.

      Those claiming this will damage League would never watch a game of league anyway .  I couldn’t agree more that League’s salvation lies in reclaiming its pride in being a rough and tough game, played by rough and tough men. 

      Now if Gallop would only grow a pair and stop undermining the game to pander to a PC crowd of losers that haven’t been to a game of League in their lives we might actually regain some pride in our sport.

    • realto says:

      04:08pm | 17/07/09

      Mondo Rock - I don’t know where you live but here in Sydney, the number of kids playing league is a fraction of what it used to be 30 years ago. They play soccer now because the parents don’t want their kids bashed by thugs. Where are the future league players going to come from? More and more it will be from the Pacific Islands. The business model for rugby league is as good as the survival plan for dinosaurs was.

    • Ball Boy says:

      09:18pm | 17/07/09

      Wait a minute. You can’t speak about a traditional owner like that. If the Fairfax press weren’t prissy, private school, rugby union ponces who hate rugby league and its working class roots they’d have your guts for garters. You should say sorry. Think of the planet.

    • stephen says:

      10:14pm | 17/07/09

      The hardest game of all. (And excuse the bad manners.)

    • Billo says:

      10:42pm | 18/07/09

      To Pete M:
      Would you really want to stop their kids playing league because of what they saw on Wednesday?
      The qualities on display included courage, toughness, strength, tremendous athleticism, wonderful skills with hands and feet, great teamwork, blokes standing up for their mates, and blokes refusing to back down when challenged.
      Do we really think that Aussie mums wouldn’t want their sons to have these qualities?
      Great sport is always played on the edge, which is why we love it.
      Sometimes, in any code, it goes over the edge, and violence or, what’s worse, cynical fouls take place. In that regard rugby league is no different to AFL, rugby or soccer.
      Rugby league players are the sort of guys who go to war on our behalf. We are lucky to have them wanting to play this great game.

    • Dane says:

      06:38pm | 16/08/09

      Mate, if you think Hodges is a coward, how about you step in the ring with him? You like to talk about your pride but the fact is, your team cant play football. For two games I watched with wide eyes at the skill level of the Blues and by the third game I think the Maroons just felt sorry for them. Four in a row and it could very well be five next year. Hodges showed true pride. He stood up for his team and his mates. You think he should have thrown a punch? See that’s why Queensland is superior and always will be, never throw the first punch mate, only the last.

 

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