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The New Daily
George Clarke

Desperate Queensland takes Origin opener with gritty 26-18 win in Adelaide

Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow scored two tries as Qld beat NSW 26-18 in Origin in Adelaide. Photo: Getty

Queensland youngsters Selwyn Cobbo and Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow have kicked off the Maroons’ State of Origin defence in style, grabbing tryscoring doubles in a drama-charged 26-18 win over New South Wales.

Tabuai-Fidow and Cobbo gave Queensland an early first-half lead before Liam Martin, Api Koroisau and Stephen Crichton put the Blues back in control.

But tries from Tabuai-Fidow and Cameron Munster in the final 10 minutes sealed victory in front of 48,613 fans at Adelaide Oval, giving the Maroons the upper hand in the series.

NSW will have to take the hard road to reclaim the State of Origin shield.

The Maroons had to overcome plenty of adversity with Tom Gilbert (shoulder) and Cobbo (leg) unable to finish the game, while Queensland saw David Fifita, Murray Taulagi (both head injury assessment) and Tom Flegler (sin-bin) spend time out of the game.

But the grit and fight on Wednesday – personified by man-of-the-match Reuben Cotter – helped the Maroons take a 1-0 lead in the series with Game II at their Suncorp Stadium fortress on June 21.

The Blues, who have won just one of their past six outings in Brisbane, lost Tom Trbojevic late in the second half (head injury assessment).

Brad Fittler’s three NSW debutants all struggled to fire but they had the lead until the last 10 minutes when Tabuai-Fidow and Munster hit back to seal victory.

Dolphins speedster Tabuai-Fidow, who was playing out of position at centre and selected ahead of Maroons stalwart Dane Gagai, dived on a Munster grubber to open the scoring after eight minutes.

Cobbo followed him over soon after and the Blues were on the back foot.

The Maroons went hunting for a third try inside the opening 30 minutes only for referee Ashley Klein to penalise them for having a 14th man on field when prop Lindsay Collins came on to replace Gilbert.

The penalty gave the Blues a shot at the Maroons’ line and while Tyson Frizell crashed over, the bunker adjudicated the hard-running Newcastle back-rower had failed to ground the ball.

With Gilbert off and his fellow edge forward Fifita getting assessed, the Blues struck back through Liam Martin.

Nathan Cleary converted Martin’s try to cut Queensland’s lead to 10-6 at half-time.

Soon into the second half the Blues found themselves in the lead when Holmes threw a rash offload that NSW hooker Api Koroisau was able to scoop up and race in to score.

Cleary converted to give the Blues a two-point lead but it didn’t last long with debutant Maroons fullback Reece Walsh sending Cobbo over in the 56th minute.

Queensland was quickly running out of troops and when Stephen Crichton crashed over with less than a quarter of an hour left the Blues looked to be heading for victory.

But Tabuai-Fidow jinked his way down field in the dying stages, rounding NSW skipper James Tedesco to put Queensland ahead, before Munster made sure of a Maroons win when he crashed over from close range.

-AAP

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