City stay contibutes to making of Origin legend
HAVING lived in a few places in my life, I know how you tend to pick up different things wherever you go.
I grew up in Sydney and finished my schooling there.
I then moved to Bathurst to go to university.
That led to heading to Orange, which is also in the New South Wales central west, for my first newspaper job.
From there, I ventured to Toowoomba to join The Chronicle in order to be closer to my family, which had moved to Brisbane while I was at uni.
Along the way, each of those places has had an impact on who I am.
So while he had a limited time in Toowoomba, the Garden City is certainly a chapter in the rise of Johnathan Thurston to rugby league legend status.
Wednesday night was supposed to be a glorious swansong for the former St Mary’s College student and precocious All Whites player from rugby league’s greatest arena - State of Origin.
Instead, Thurston will have to watch on from the sidelines at a maroon-laden Suncorp Stadium as his Queensland brothers try to pull out what seemed an unlikely series victory just a month ago.
It isn’t the way champions should bow out but it is unfortunately the hand Thurston has been dealt.
Rather than being remembered as a spectator at the 2017 decider, the playmaker’s Origin legacy will be as the ironman of Queensland’s record run of eight series wins.
In the toughest and fiercest battle grounds in the game, Thurston’s record of playing 36 consecutive Origin games will be near impossible to best.
He then came out the next game after that streak ended, dodgy shoulder and all, and lifted the Maroons back into this year’s series after a New South Wales demolition job in game one.
Thurston won’t get the fairytale Origin swansong on Wednesday night but his efforts in this year’s series emphasis his standing in Origin history as it’s greatest
competitor.
And while his time in Toowoomba was limited to finishing his schooling at St Mary’s and working on his skills at Glenholme Park, it
has played a role in the journey from the southern suburbs of Brisbane to rugby league legend via Toowoomba, Belmore and Townsville.