Coast bids adieu to legend of the game

THANK you Johnathan Thurston for 11 Origin Series wins, your 39 matches for Australia and playing your final rugby league match on the Gold Coast.

The great’s swansong brought the largest crowd to Cbus Stadium in nine years, more than doubled the revenue the Titans expected from the match and created one hell of a buzz around the city.

The match on Saturday night was the last opportunity league fans had to watch the future Immortal play the game and 26,681 were in the stands to say goodbye.

The crowd was almost 10,000 more than at any Titans game this year.

“It is fair to say we more than doubled our projected budget for the game,” Titans outgoing chief executive officer Graham Annesley said.

“It was amazing to the see the ground so full, even though we didn’t break the record.

“It was an amazing crowd, the atmosphere was outstanding and it was a fitting tribute for a guy who will go on to eventually be an Immortal. For two teams that were sitting around the bottom of the table to draw that crowd and that atmosphere says a lot about the man.”

It was the sixth largest crowd at Cbus Stadium, the largest since the All Stars Game in 2010 and since the Titans played the Broncos in a final in September, 2009. The match against the Broncos set the attendance record at Cbus with 27,227.

Saturday was less than 600 behind that record, and with two teams that finished 13th and 14th on the ladder.

Member for Broadwater David Crisafulli was at the match and after-party at The Star.

“The city was alive,” he said. “It was very fortuitous his last game was here, fortuitous for the Titans who did well and the city did well economically too.”

Mr Crisafulli said the gracious Gold Coast crowd gave Thurston the send-off he deserved.

“I’m proud to say farewell to the footballing career of a great but more proud to be a Gold Coaster for the way the crowd treated him,” he said.

“It shows you a lot about the kind of people who call the Gold Coast home.

“It is the city of a fair go, city of reward for effort and city of recognition.”

Picture: DARREN ENGLAND Johnathan Thurston walks from the ground after playing his final NRL game at Cbus Super Stadium on Saturday,

Pictured clockwise from left: JT says goodbye; a 60-second standing ovation for a legend took place in the seventh minute; and the packed Cbus Super Stadium from the air.