We upset Manly in the third last game, at Pirtek. A f**king awesome win, in a big game. Maybe Manly shat the bed? They were coming first at the time but then went on to win one from the next four, missing out on the minor premiership and going out of the finals in straight sets. We lost the next two away, but the Knights were no worse than us that year, with an almost identical points differential. The Raiders loss (in Canberra) was an upset, and the players probably panicked, but there was f**k all big game experience in that team. Bad luck or poor recruiting? Or just the coach's fault?
Well it's a dumb point. The Cowboys played well in that finals series because of all the Origin and finals experience, not because of their coach. Coaches don't win games, teams do.
We made the grand final with a lot of luck though. We never had that great a team, even in 2022. We only had three players picked in Origin that year (five games total). Two years later we had two players picked for three games, with two of those games coming from Moses, who missed most of the NRL season. In 2015 the Cowboys had four players for 12 appearances, and in 2017 when they made the grand final, they had four players for eight appearances, not including Thurston.
Just because they lost doesn't mean they were unprepared. There's two teams out there. If they're both prepared, one of them will still probably lose.
They do, but when that happens it's because the favourite didn't play their best. Like when the Cowboys shat the bed in 2022. They had a better team than us and a much better points differential, and we stood up while they didn't.
Whether NSW lost the series is irrelevant. If anything those Panthers players might've taken motivation from it. How many of them never played Origin again after that series loss?
