The Queensland rugby league team have taken home the 2007 State Of Origin title after the second match at Telstra Stadium in Sydney on Wednesday night. In the last 11 encounters at Telstra Stadium, the Queensland team have lost ten times and drawn once; the monkey was finally shaken off the back of Queensland as they won the 2007 State Of Origin series.
The first half was very fast, with next to nothing slowing down the movement of the ball. Only nine minutes into the first half and New South Wales Brett Stewart passes through some soft Queensland defense near the line. Twelve minutes later and Queensland strike back with Greg Inglis scoring a try on the left wing, leveling the scores at six all after a successful conversion. A number of players from both teams left the field with possibly injuries, some returning later in the match. In typical State Of Origin fashion, there was a lot of hard running and big hits. Amazingly, during the entire match no team seemed to have clear offensive dominance, with no major line breaks worth mentioning. At the end of the first 40 minutes of play, the scores were still locked at 6-6.
The second half started with New South Wales clearly increasing the intensity of their running in an attempt to bust through an impressive defensive line from Queensland. The harder New South Wales were running, the more Queensland defenders were entering the tackle to neutralise their offense; even the barn storming Willie Mason had little impact throughout the match against the Queensland defense. With only 15 minutes remaining in the second half, Queensland back Steve Bell charges onto a Thurston grubber to score and take Queensland into a 10-6 lead. From the point on in the game, both teams upped their efforts in offense and defense with the last 3 minutes mandating that everyone be on the edge of their seats.
The winning score for Queensland for the 2007 State Of Origin series was 10-6 and they now enter the third match already having secured the State Of Origin title for 2007.
QUEENSLANDER!