Blues Take Origin Lead

New South Wales have begun this year's State Of Origin series with a strong 18-10 victory over Queensland at ANZ Stadium tonight.

The Blues, who lost the 2007 series 2-1, began the match in style with a try inside the first five minutes before they scored another 2 to have the first three tries of the match.

Queensland hit back with a late first-half try to make the score 14-4 at the break, but the Blues' impressive opening stanza proved too big a mountain to climb for the Maroons.

It was debutant Anthony Quinn who got the Blues going with the first try of the match. Good lead-up work from Greg Bird and Ryan Hoffman got the ball wide on the left to Brett Stewart, although he needed a great take, before he committed Maroons' full-back Billy Slater and fired the ball to Quinn who had time and space for the opener.

New South Wales had most of the attacking possession in the first-half and halfback Peter Wallace was looking good on debut with several dangerous kicks. Queensland tried to fight back in defence especially with Karmichael Hunt landing some big hits on Hoffman.

But the pressure eventually weighed on the Maroons and a Wallace kick was perfectly positioned for Quinn to grab his second try of the night after he out jumped Queensland centre Brent Tate. The conversion was missed but the Blues had a ten nil lead after just twenty minutes. It was the ideal start in front of the home fans.

The next fifteen minutes saw Queensland fight back into the game with Johnathan Thurston getting more involved and the Maroons created a few half opportunities.

The Blues though, went out to a 14-point lead with five minutes to go in the half when forward Anthony Laffranchi offloaded to Stewart who set Mark Gasnier off on a break before the centre returned the ball inside for Stewart to score the try.

New South Wales had their tails wagging going into half-time before the Maroons stunned them with a late try on the siren. Thurston's low kick went in behind the Blues defence and Tate got a hand on the ball to score four points, as was rightly awarded by the video referee. Queensland had something to build on for the second-half.

The early part of the second-half though was riddled with errors. New South Wales's Ben Cross and Queensland's Michael Crocker exchanged mistakes in the middle of the park on early tackles in a matter of seconds. It was clear both sides were getting tired from the fierce contest.

In the 52nd minute, Queensland almost received a lifeline when a deep kick from Wallace put Maroons fullback Billy Slater in trouble but the Melbourne Storm player incredibly dodged the Blues' tackles and almost took the ball the length of the field with help from Greg Inglis. Justin Hodges eventually went close from the play but the Blues managed to ultimately hold Queensland at bay.

Then with fifteen minutes to go, Anthony Quinn's dream debut got better when he forced a mistake from Thurston. From the resulting set, the Blues went over through another debutant Laffranchi. Bird delivered a swift cut-out pass to Gasnier who again used his pace before passing inside for Laffranchi to finish off the Maroons.

Queensland were beaten, but almost got a stunning reply from the next play after a short kick-off. In the last ten minutes, Hodges was held up over the line by Willie Mason and Tate had a video referee decision go against him.

In the dying moments of the second-half, like the first, Queensland managed to score. Israel Folau took his chance when the Maroons found numbers on the left to gain some pride with a late converted try.

It was all too late though for the visitors, as the 67,620 fans went home happy after seeing Craig Bellamy's Blues outplay the Maroons 18-10, to set up another classic series.

NSW 18 (Tries; Quinn 2, Stewart, Laffranchi, Conversions; Fitzgibbon) def Queensland 10 (Tries; Tate, Folau, Conversions; Thurston) Crowd: 67,620