May 26, 2004
Game I of the 2004 State of Origin series featured one of the all-time memorable build-ups to an Origin game, as Mark Gasnier and Anthony Minichello were both dropped by New South Wales mere days after being picked by Phil Gould (It would've been Gasnier's Origin debut), after a classic Origin camp bonding session turned into a raging bender, that ended with Gasnier leaving a text message on a woman's phone at 3:41 in the morning, which was never forgotten by Roy & HG:
""Where the **** are you? There's four toey humans in the cab with sausages ready to spurt sauce. It's 20 to four...and you're in bed, **** me. Fire up, you sad ****."
Quite an impressive message to type out whilst blind drunk in the days before auto correct.
Both players copped their bullets and came back during the series, and instead it would be Gaz's Dragons teammate Ben Hornby debuting at fullback for the Blues, and joining him on debut was Dragons teammate Brent Kite, Penrith premiership winners Trent Waterhouse, Luke Rooney and Luke Lewis, plus Raiders prop Ryan O'Hara (His only Origin appearance)...
On the flip side for Queensland, Panthers fullback Rhys Wesser debuted, another Panther in Ben Ross debuted off the bench, Chris Flannery had to partner Scott Prince in the halves with Darren Lockyer injured, and there was also a debut for a 20-year-old from Innisfail named Billy Slater, who played on the wing but made minimal impact, at least compared to what he would achieve in Game II.
As for Game I, the wet weather in Sydney turned the match at Telstra Stadium into a classic Origin slog, as Queensland led 4-0 at the half thanks to Scott Prince scoring from a dummy half run, then Dragons five-eighth Shaun Timmins, who had overcome 5 knee operations in 12 months to make it back to Origin football, scored the Blues' only try of the game early in the 2nd Half to put them ahead 6-4 after Craig Fitzgibbon converted, then Fitz added another penalty a few minutes later to make the lead 8-4.
However, Brent Tate tied the scores with 20 minutes to play thanks to a line break from Prince, but Cameron Smith missed the sideline conversion to leave the score at 8 apiece, and the scores would remain that way for the next 20 minutes, despite plenty of major near misses:
Maroons captain Shane Webcke (His only game as Maroons captain) nearly fed Slater through to score the winner with 10 minutes to go, only for the touch judge to correctly spot a forward pass.
Andrew Ryan getting cut down by Rhys Wesser 5 metres out, which led to New South Wales getting a penalty for offside in the 73rd minute, but Fitzgibbon's sideline kick stayed just wide.
That led to Wesser being tackled in goal for a dropout, but Matt Gidley dropped the ball on the goal line before the last tackle, during which Tate was whacked by a stray elbow from his own captain Webcke.
Craig Gower missed his first field goal attempt in the 76th minute, then lined up for another attempt in the 79th minute but fumbled the ball prior to the kick and knocked on, leaving Phil Gould shuddering on camera.
Queensland had the last attempt at a field goal from a dropout (Slater tackling Luke Lewis) with 10 seconds left, but Slater's rushed kick was charged down by Blues captain Danny Buderus, and Steve Price sent the ball out of play to prevent a last gasp winner - This would turn out to be Queensland's only attempt at a field goal during the game, and even then it was a Hail Mary.
Thus, the game went to Golden Point, the first in Origin football since the rule was introduced in 2003, and the first field goal attempt went to the Blues, but Gower's third attempt at a game-winner would be charged down by Tonie Carroll... Gower also suffered a knee injury and missed the rest of the series.
After Queensland's set gained little ground, the Blues charged forward again in the 83rd minute, and it was left to Timmins to kick the game-winning field goal and enter the history books as the first player to score in Golden Point during State of Origin, and Timmins nailed the kick from 37 metres out, leading to him being mobbed by every Blues player, plus coach Gould.
The game winner was one of only two field goals Timmins kicked in his career, the other was in 1996 for Illawarra against Cronulla.
Amazingly, there's only been 1 other golden point State Of Origin game since 2004, which was Game I of the 2005 series at Lang Park, when the scores finished 20 apiece and the game was decided by Matt Bowen intercepting Brett Kimmorley to score the winning try for Queensland in the 84th minute.
Game I of 2004 also extended Queensland's horror run against New South Wales at Stadium Australia to 8 games without a win since the first Origin game there in 1999, their best result being the draw in Game III of 2002 - That run would continue until Game II of 2007, when the Maroons won at the 12th time of asking.
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