Billy Slater has hailed his team's efforts as Queensland hammered a sorry New South Wales 34-6 in Brisbane's Suncorp Stadium to seal an unprecedented fifth straight State of Origin series win.
The triumph buried the demons of last year's dead rubber 28-16 loss to NSW at the same ground and compounded a miserable week for the beleaguered Blues.
The Blues camp has been embroiled in controversy after winger Timanu Tahu walked out in protest at racist comments made by assistant coach Andrew Johns aimed at Queensland's Greg Inglis.
Johns has since resigned and it was fitting that Inglis - who said he wanted to respond to Johns' comments on the field crossed the Blues' tryline on three minutes. "It's a tremendous feeling," Maroons full-back Billy Slater said. "This group of blokes have achieved so much, and I'm just happy to be a part of it.
"The boys just keep digging in for each other and putting pride in the maroon jersey."
The hosts ran in a total of six tries and never looked back after Inglis' score. Israel Folau and Darius Boyd crossed before half-time and Mal Meninga's men ran in a further three tries after the break, courtesy of a second from Folau and one each from Willie Tonga and Cooper Cronk.
After narrowly losing 28-24 in game one in Sydney, the Blues never turned up in what was a typically feisty encounter.
But there was to be no repeat of last year's full-scale brawl, with Blues' halfback Trent Barrett admitting his team couldn't wait to get away from the sea of maroon in the imposing cauldron. "It's certainly not the result we were after, or expected," Barrett said. "You can't make that many mistakes against that sort of opposition.
"We've got to save some pride and win back in Sydney. It's pretty humiliating up here in front of this many people."
Meanwhile, Tahu has said the racist outburst that prompted his walkout was not an isolated incident for the sport.
"I want to clarify that it was not just one racial comment directed at one individual that affected me," Tahu said. "The remarks were directed at various races and the situation I encountered was totally unacceptable."
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