Laurie Daley coached New South Wales to win an Origin decider at Suncorp Stadium.

He did it.

He actually did it.

Laurie Daley won an Origin decider, and he won it in Lang Park, and not only that, New South Wales turned it around after the 2nd Half massacre in Melbourne and absolutely shat on Queensland in their own graveyard, despite losing James Tedesco and Jack Bostock to HIAs, and had the fans leaving in droves before the final siren.

Isaah Yeo’s forward pack did the bullying, the Maroons backs made a heap of early errors that they never recovered from, Bradman Best and Liam Martin just get Origin, Mitchell Moses’ kicking game was brutally effective, and Nathan Cleary finally delivered a Origin decider performance that people had wanted him to deliver for years, taking out a second Player of the Match award (First player in 15 years to get 2 in a series), winning the Wally Lewis Medal at long last, breaking Michael O’Connor’s New South Wales points record (Which had stood for 35 years), and tying Johnathan Thurston’s record for the most points in a deciding Game III, and of course he did decline the chance to break the record by turning down the kick on the siren so the celebrations could start early.

Amazing, the perfect revenge for Game III of 2025, and to cap it all off, as quite a few people expected Loz to do, he has seemingly resigned the morning after the game:

BUT, it was not as a beaten 6-time series loser as I had predicted mercilessly, but a man who had done what nobody expected him and his team to achieve, his legacy with the New South Wales Origin team having been healed for all of time, and he promptly rode off into the sunset in scenes resembling the end of The Last Crusade.

Another interesting fact – Queensland have not won at Suncorp since 2023, making this the first time since 1996 to 1998 (Which was 4 wins in a row) that New South Wales have won 3 consecutive games in Brisbane.

It’s a Graveyard alright… for Queensland.

Of course, there was also the prominent factor of the Queenslanders having a few gripes with the Bunker and Ashley Klein’s performance, given Cameron Munster had an audible chat with Klein and was rather critical of the calls, then Bradman Best’s length of the field try that put the Blues up 24-8 was ultimately upheld by the Bunker despite there being evidence of Jack Bostock getting a fingertip to the ball (Which the NRL have seemingly admitted as such), and there’s a conspiracy that the Bunker was also affected by the nationwide Telstra outage, then another try which would’ve made it 16-24 with 11 minutes left was wiped out by Max Plath being in front of the kicker… Nathan Cleary hit the sealing penalty goal a few minutes later, and the game was over.

And finally, let’s also remember – BILLY SLATER LOST AN ORIGIN DECIDER TO LAURIE DALEY.

Get him in the Broncos job immediately.

Now, on to Round 19 of club season, with just 2 months remaining until the finals begin, and it does seem a bit cruel that 50th edition of NAIDOC Week is going to get lost in the World’s Biggest Birthday Party scene that Souths are putting on for the newly married Jai Arrow, because that is a fantastic milestone for the First Nations of Australia, and on one hand you’d have thought it would be a good time to hold the annual Indigenous Round celebration, but with it being so close to Origin III it wouldn’t have had the same impact (Plus there’s only 7 games this week), which explains why it’s being held in August.

So, the games:

– With Jarome Luai turning out to be a very naughty boy instead of the Tigers’ messiah, the Wests Tigers host the New Zealand Warriors at Campbelltown in the lone Friday night game, a very rare appearance of the Tigers on Friday night footy, and a very rare appearance of Campbelltown on a Friday night… and it’s also tough on the Warriors because the game will be starting at 10pm in New Zealand.

– The biggest match of the week as the Dolphins play the Sharks in Redcliffe, the first game at Kayo Stadium since April 2, a date Dolphins fans prefer to forget as Kieran Foran debuted as an NRL coach and Manly slaughtered the Dolphins 52-18

– Canterbury host Canberra at Accor Stadium, the first time the Raiders have played at the Olympic Stadium since 2023, and the loser will just about get wiped out any sort of contention in 2026 as both teams linger outside the Top 8, although form would favour the Berries as they’ve won 4 out of their last 5 after going very cold through April and May

– The Saturday night feature presentation has the Sydney Roosters hosting Parramatta at Allianz, and the highlight is that Daniel Tupou, the 3rd greatrest tryscorer ever seen, is back from injury to play his 300th NRL game for Easts, joining the likes of Luke Ricketson, Anthony Minichiello, Mitchell Aubusson and Jared Waerea-Hargreaves, and a stat that I saw from David Middleton is that the Eels haven’t defeated the Roosters in Moore Park since Round 22 2008, when they won 28-24 at the old SFS…

Streaks are always there to be broken, as Wednesday night proved.

– South Sydney host Newcastle on Sunday afternoon, the feature event of JAI JULY, because it’s the World’s Biggest Birthday Party on what will be Jai Arrow’s 31st birthday… July 12, he’s got the same birthday as the kid that played Dewey on Malcolm in the Middle.

– Manly get the Channel 9 Sunday game against the North Queensland Cowboys at Brookvale, as they attempt to win their 1000th First Grade game for the second time after the Eels pulled their pants down last Sunday, with that result leaving them 2 wins adrift of the Top 4, and the Cowboys come off the bye after they upended Penrith in Jason Taumalolo’s 300th game, and the Cowboys would have to be the unluckiest team in the league right now, because they’re the only team with a winning record that aren’t in the Top 8 – In fact, if they win this they’ll jump the Sea Eagles and absolutely sit in the Top 8!

– And the final game of the round has the Melbourne Storm hosting the Gold Coast Titans at AAMI Park, and it’s not often we get to see a 6pm game in Melbourne, especially given there’s an afternoon game at the MCG finishing 15 minutes before the kickoff, but with a host of players back from injury and the Origin representatives backing up, the Storm once again go for their 500th NRL win in their 753rd game, and the good news for the Titans is that even if they lose, they’re still ahead of the Broncos.

And on that note, here’s the tips:

Round 18 tips = 2/5

Round 18 progress score = 86/133 (64.6%)

And for the musical tribute of the week…. it’s got to be Bonnie Tyler, with a tribute to Queensland.