Former Blues halves Mitchell Pearce and Todd Carney have had their say on the Blues’ series defeat, declaring Billy Slater simply “out-coached” Laurie Daley.
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The Blues looked on track to retain the shield in dominant fashion if the 18-6 Game 1 win was anything to go by, with Slater responding by making the all-or-nothing call to dump skipper Daly Cherry-Evans.
It turned out to be a bold masterstroke from the Queensland coach, who Pearce credited for constantly adapting his game plan throughout the series to outsmart a predictable Blues outfit.
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“I think everyone in the state would be hurting… especially as ex-players you know how disappointing and deflating it is not only for the fans and everyone in the state but the players,” Pearce said on the Sixes and Sevens Podcast.
“But I think the most deflating thing for the players (is) they’d be shaking their heads thinking ‘what the f*** just happened?’. That was the first thing I was thinking after the game.
“I’ve got to put it straight out, I think we got out-coached.
“I think Billy Slater came in with a plan. Clearly their edge defence was outstanding for 80 minutes. It was relentless. The game plan was to shut down our edges with quick line speed.
“I just thought we got out-coached.”
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Pearce said the Maroons seemed to have two clear aims in Wednesday’s decider: a high completion rate and consistent, rushing defence.
Considering they finished with the best completion rate in State of Origin history it is safe to say Queensland achieved the first one, while the disorganised nature of NSW’s attack was a product of the Maroons’ defensive pressure so that was a success too.
“I just thought they took out all our best players. They took out Cleary. They took out Lomax. He had no room to move,” Pearce added.
“When you lose everyone criticises your best players… it was caused by pressure from Queensland and lack of possession for us. Our forwards were f***ed… Robson came off in the 53rd minute and made 41 tackles, that’s unheard of.
“No one can win a game when you’re on the back of that much possession (and) it was all from the system and the coaching of Queensland.”
Blues skipper Isaah Yeo conceded in his post-game press conference alongside Daley that NSW knew Queensland would defend the way it did, which begs the question: why weren’t they better prepared to combat it?
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To that point, Carney questioned how flexible NSW’s coaching staff was with its game plan.
“Even before the game on Channel Nine Billy spoke about his plan, about what he was going into the game for. Loz spoke about the great week they’ve had in camp, he didn’t really speak about what the team was going to do in the night,” Carney said.
“In each camp, Queensland was always talking about (how) they had a plan to combat New South Wales in some way. We always just went with the same, ‘We’ve had a great week. The boys have come together really good’.
“Of course they’re going to come together really good. They’re a great bunch of players and great bunch of blokes.
“But we never really spoke about our plan to beat Queensland ever, like they didn’t change anything. Where I think every game Queensland had a different plan to beat us.”
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The nature of NSW’s series defeat has put the microscope on Daley as a coach, but he was emphatic that he is still the man to lead the Blues in 2026.
When asked why he was so confident, Daley said he liked the way the Blues were “building” throughout the series. It was something Pearce took issue with.
“I think where we’re at now as a squad where we’ve got young, fresh players, I think that building is not relevant,” he said.
“You can’t build from year to year. You’ve got players available and depth in positions. There’s no time to build. It’s now or never really, isn’t it?
“Every year you basically win or you lose… it’s not an NRL club where you rebuild. I get it if you just lost all your legend players and you’ve got a group of young players… but where we’re at at the moment I don’t think we’re building.
“We’ve got the calibre there. Everyone’s talking about how good our roster is. We ain’t building. We need to deliver.”
