Kalyn Ponga was sent off at Accor Stadium on Wednesday night after a hit on Tolu Koula, and Queensland were left to finish State of Origin I with 12 men for the final 23 minutes. Ashley Klein ordered Ponga from the field after Chris Butler, the bunker official, backed the call.
That decision mattered because Queensland had been 20 points ahead before New South Wales clawed all the way back to win from 0-20 down. The send-off became the point everyone kept returning to as the game changed shape, and it did so quickly. Queensland never recovered the territory or the numbers, and the loss turned on a contest that had looked settled.
Sam Walker, superb on debut, was among the Queensland players left to absorb the collapse, but the late NSW surge took the game away from him and his teammates. New South Wales finished with more ball, 300 more run metres and five line breaks to two, a stat line that matched the flow of the final 20 minutes, when it had the extra man advantage of 13 v 12 for much of the pressure period.
There was also a moment earlier that loomed larger after the finish: Queensland did not take a simple two points at 6-20, leaving a chance on the table before the comeback gathered speed. Then James Tedesco sprinted, leapt and took the ball under the rain at Accor Stadium to deliver the decisive late play, before saying, “That’s what Origin’s all about. All the way to the 80th minute,” a line that fit a match that refused to settle until the end.
The immediate question now is not how much the send-off changed the night — the answer was obvious — but what consequence Ponga faces next. Origin II is scheduled for June 17 at the MCG, and Queensland will spend the next two weeks living with a loss that started with one hit and ended with a comeback they could not stop.
