BY CURTIS WOODWARD

@woodward_curtis

State of Origin is here! Drink it in baby!

After the year we have had, why shouldn’t be get our dose of the greatest thing in Australian sport?

It’s mate against mate.

State against state.

There’s nothing better.

Let’s check out some old fables from Australia’s ultimate rivalry.

HOPPA VERSUS DANNY MOORE’S WIFE

Everybody remembers the infamous brawl at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 1995. It was epic and it felt like it went forever. Whispers before the game suggested there was going to be a fight in the first scrum of the match. Fans in attendance weren’t disappointed as it quickly erupted with spot fires across the ground. Manly teammates John Hopoate (Blues) and Danny Moore (Maroons) found each other and unsurprisingly, Hopoate was pretty keen to throw them. The fight died down and the game recommenced but Danny Moore’s wife didn’t forget. Later in the night at a bar in Melbourne, Mrs. Moore cornered ’Hoppa’ and gave him one back… straight in the face.

PHIL DALEY SACKED

You couldn’t meet a nicer bloke and the big prop explained what happened on the Top of the Props podcast. Ahead of Origin in 1988, Daley’s wife was heavily pregnant. While in camp, Daley stepped out to see his wife at the hospital. The next day, he was sent home and replaced. Daley is adamant nobody ever said he couldn’t leave camp.

FINCH’S BENDER INCLUDED INCREDIBLE ORIGIN MOMENT

Roosters halfback Brett Finch was enjoying a fair drinking session after a victory on a Sunday in 2006. As he admits, he was trying to dry out on his lounge on Tuesday night when he received a call from Blues management. And it wasn’t like he was next in line. Craig Gower got injured. His replacement Matt Orford went down too. Andrew Johns and Trent Barrett refused to come out of representative retirement. So the Blues turned to Finch. The larrikin playmaker hit a 35-metre bomb with a minute to go to hand the Blues victory in Game I. For this writer, when you look at the set back, Finch was perfect. He directed the side down field on every play. Watch it yourself. The bender continued.

TAHU QUITS THE BLUES

Blues star Timana Tahu walked out of a NSW video session and never came back after racist remarks made by Andrew Johns in 2010. Johns and Tahu won a premiership together at the Knights in 2001 but that meant nothing after Johns made comment about one of Queensland’s indigenous players. Good on Timana.

ROBBIE KEARNS IS ‘BUCKED’

New Blues coach Wayne Pearce took Origin bonding to a new level in 1999 by putting his players on horses up in the Blue Mountains. Everything was fine until NSW prop Robbie Kearns fell off one of the beasts and broke his shoulder. He missed all three games.

THE ‘BIG MARN’ NEVER GETS HIS AUSSIE JERSEY

Daryl Brohman is known now as a larger-than-life media personality but in the 1980’s, Brohman was a masterful prop on his way to a maiden Kangaroos jersey. That was until he was smashed in the face by Les Boyd’s elbow which ended with his jaw broken. According to reports, Brohman was about to be picked for Australia to play against New Zealand. He never played for the Kangaroos.

‘New Queensland versus Reef State’: What would Origin look like if North Queensland broke away from the rest of the state?

BEETSON

The legendary Arthur Beetson shouldn’t have even made the field for the first, real ‘Origin’ in 1980. Picked as captain, Beetson had broken his jaw just a few weeks prior to the match at Lang Park. Wally Lewis has reported since that at a team dinner just prior to the match, ‘Big Artie’ downed six bowls of soup through a straw.

WHERE DID THE COCKROACHES COME FROM?

Iconic Queenslander Barry Muir hated New South Wales and he’d spent years giving to those south of the Tweed. He never played in Sydney but represented Australia 25 times. Sitting at home watching an old interstate match in the 1970’s, Muir peered up above the crackly television screen at the antenna sticking out the top of the box. Right there, he dubbed NSW ‘cockroaches’.

@woodward_curtis