2007 Round 11 vs Brisbane Broncos:
Brisbane 71 defeated Newcastle 6.
An injury depleted Newcastle suffered their worst ever defeat at the hands of a Brisbane side re-energised by Queensland's State of Origin win, going down 71-6. Newcastle lost Kurt Gidley, Danny Buderus and Steve Simpson from the mid-week Origin clash, while Brisbane were riding high from the Queensland victory. And while the Knights may have been missing some key personnel, there was no excuse for the pathetic performance which resulted in the shocking scoreline.
Tonie Carroll sent a warning through the Knights camp when he raced through paper-thin defence in the 7th minute. Ben Hannant scored from a hit up a couple of metres out in the 15th minute, and Petero Civoniceva finished off a long range try in the 22nd minute to hand Brisbane an 18-0 lead.
Newcastle looked to have hit back to give themselves a chance just before halftime - and if they only scored one try, at least it was a memorable one. Adam Woolnough took the ball to the 40 metre line and offloaded around the corner to Jarrod Mullen, who raced the rest of the way to score - easily stepping Karmichael Hunt in the process.
But any thoughts of a comeback were nipped in the bud as Brisbane added a converted try to Brent Tate, and a Darren Lockyer field goal right on the stroke of halftime, to lead 25-6.
The second half was a flood of points to Brisbane, as they added 46 unanswered points against the hapless Knights. Defence up the middle of the ruck was atrocious - amazingly the Newcastle centres Adam MacDougall and Brad Tighe only missed one tackle between them!
Clint Newton played his 100th game for the Knights, but during the week announced he was leaving immediately to join the Melbourne Storm for the remainder of the 2007 season.
What they said:
Brian Smith:
[On the missing Origin players] "It's not just those guys we're missing. If you run through the alphabet, you'll find someone starting with every letter. Abraham and Bailey and Buderus and Carmont and Davico and Gidley … and, do you want me to keep going?"
"Everybody from time to time has to take their medicine with some tough calls and, personnel-wise, we just had a lot of guys who we think are real talents and can be good performers for the Newcastle Knights, but not all on the one day. You also saw the nth degree, or whatever comes after nth, of what the rep season can do to a club, and in our case it hit us very heavily this week."
"The way the Broncos played today, we could have had all of our Origin boys playing and still got ourselves into trouble. In the end, the video ref, the referee, the touch judges - everyone was having a party at our expense."
"Coaching's tough. It might happen to you one day. It has happened. If you coach long enough, it will happen to you."
Jarrod Mullen:
"It's been a bit of a reality check. I was on cloud nine when I got picked for the Origin and then you get beat by seven in that. Then you come out and get flogged today. It brings you back down to earth. I've got a lot of work to do on my game. It all starts tomorrow."