Why Cameron Munster is always Queensland’s Origin saviour

Source : ABC NEWS

It’s a strange twist of fate that Cameron Munster has never won a State of Origin match in his adopted home town of Melbourne.

In his ten series as a Maroon, it’s about the only place Munster hasn’t tasted victory. He has hoisted the colours behind enemy lines in Sydney and at the blood temple of Lang Park.

He has won when Origin has been taken far and wide and showcased as far away as Adelaide and Perth in an effort to lure new souls into the game.

But south of the border is a small gap in the resume. Munster lost the only game he ever played at the MCG and has perhaps his final chance to break the duck in Origin II on Wednesday night.

And if it is to happen and if Queensland can save a series that’s on the edge of a knife you can be certain Munster will be at the heart of it, as he has been for just about every Maroons triumph since his debut almost a decade ago.

It is striking now to go back to that night in 2017 when Munster, with a crew cut that made him look like an overgrown kid who was told to get rid of a summer hairdo before he went back to school, first got a little piece of eternity. 

The Maroons were back in Brisbane for the decider without Johnathan Thurston after his heroics to win Game II in Sydney. On the recommendation of Cameron Smith, Queensland coach Kevin Walters threw Munster into the fire.

Through the week, it threatened to burn him. By Smith’s own admission, Munster was hopeless at training.

But on the night it mattered, he was magic. In one of the greatest debuts in Origin history, Munster set up two tries in a 22-6 Queensland win that rates as Smith’s favourite of the 42 matches he played for his state.

Since then the equation for the Queenslanders has been pretty simple. When Origin has run through Munster, they have won. When it hasn’t, they have lost.

He has been at the heart of all their triumphs, which is why he is Queensland’s modern folk hero, the inheritor of a legacy passed from Wally Lewis to Allan Langer to Darren Lockyer to the masters of the dynasty.

If you count said dynasty as lasting through Queensland’s 11 series wins in 12 years from 2006 to 2017, when they were under the watch of Smith, Greg Inglis, Johnathan Thurston, Billy Slater and Cooper Cronk, then Munster is the last man left.

His Origin life began as the old heroes were departing. His first Origin came directly after Thurston’s last, making him the direct successor at five-eighth.

Barring a surprise return from some greybeards, he will be the last Queensland Origin player who played alongside Cronk and Smith.

Along with Kalyn Ponga, he is already among the last two who played alongside Greg Inglis and the last two who knew Slater as a teammate before they knew him as a coach.

In the years since, Queensland’s fortunes have shaped themselves around Munster, like in 2020 when he was player of the series as the worst Queensland team ever conjured a miracle.

In 2022 he won man of the match in Game I in Sydney to give the Maroons a crucial 1-0 lead for their first win in New South Wales for five series.

The following year it was his try in Adelaide that put the series opener beyond doubt and in 2025 he was man of the match again in a Game II victory in Perth that kept the series alive.

The latter game was the first time he captained the side but he did not need to captain a Queensland team to already be a piece of Queensland itself.

He was already everything the Maroons want and need their Origin heroes to be, a player who is as fearless as he is free, who always appears when his state needs him most.

In doing so, the ghosts of the pasts and the old legends of the state speak through him.

His record is far from flawless. Munster only played in all three matches of a winning series once in his first six years in Origin. 

But part of the Queenslanders’ alchemy is the way their success dwarfs their failures.

They only keep what makes them stronger and that includes memories of their defeats.

They retain them only as a foundation from which to rise again and never seem poisoned by them like New South Wales can be. 

Sometimes it’s like they believe losing only exists to make the next win feel even better and Queensland has runs on this magic and has done since the Arthur Beetson days.

It’s why their Origin story is at it’s greatest when men become larger than life and other players have touched it alongside Munster, but only sometimes.

Ponga found it in the 2022 decider, when Munster was a late scratching due to COVID.

Reece Walsh grabbed it the following year, seeming like the new king with a triumphant send-off in Origin II following a best on ground performance, slapping his chest and bathing in the love of his people.

Tom Dearden got some of it in the decider in 2025, riding shotgun to Munster during some of the latter’s toughest days.

But for each of them the time in the sun has been fleeting and getting there once is not enough, not if you want to live forever.

Ponga hasn’t played in a full series since that breakthrough year, Walsh can’t get back in the starting team at the moment and injury has kept Dearden out of this series.

They all still have time on their side but right now each of them can only aspire to return to the halls of glory and reach a place Munster conquered long ago.

They’re not alone in it either. Munster’s quality is known among his footballing enemies long before he meets them on the field.

Ethan Strange is from the other state and his own Origin debut in Game I stands alongside Munster’s as one of the best in recent times. The 21-year old Blue idolises Munster and why wouldn’t he?

He is so like Munster was, powerful and dynamic and a little bit sick in the head in the best way possible.

During last year’s Kangaroo Tour, Strange couldn’t keep his eyes off Munster.

“I loved watching him growing up, so I’d just watch him at training, see how him and Nathan [Cleary] went about their work. I’m a visual thinker like that,” Strange said.

“He’s such a great ball-runner but everything he does [stands out], really.”

There was a point in Origin I where Strange blew right by Munster. Early in the second half, off a set play they use down in Canberra, Strange got one-on-one with the legend and beat him stone dead to cross the line.

The try was disallowed due to an obstruction and the play itself was Cleary’s idea. The Raiders had used it against Penrith in their epic win in Mudgee last year and Cleary liked the look of it.

These days, Munster himself is more likely to be the latter in that equation than the former. He’s more of an architect than the roughneck he used to be.

While he can still move when he has to with a running game that will never really leave him, Munster’s game is now more based around direction and cunning than anything else.

For a player who once compared his thought process to a monkey bashing cymbals together, he was always smarter than he wanted to let on and now he reaps the benefits.

He spends lots of time in first receiver, for Melbourne and for Queensland. It’s what freed up Dearden to win player of the series last year and plays to Munster’s current strengths, allowing him to be as valuable as a leader and a symbol as he is as a footballer.

He also tamed his temperament for the most part and is a long way away from the player who was twice sin-binned, including once for kicking, in the 2018 grand final.

Such growth, a meeting between the unpredictable gambler and the razor intellect that grew over time, was necessary. After 12 full seasons in first grade, almost 250 matches and some hard living beside, Munster could not be a wild thing forever otherwise he wouldn’t have lasted this long.

But sometimes to find out where you’re going you need to go back where you’ve been. Over the past few weeks Munster has gone back to the old ways and proven he has never forgotten how to light a few fires.

He’s got his swagger back. In Origin I Munster ran the ball 14 times, more than he has in any game for Melbourne this season, and his desperation for the contest was clear to see.

In his last outing for the Storm against Newcastle he played like a carnivore as he tried to pick a fight with Ponga and had a running battle with Dane Gagai, an old friend who Munster treated like a hated enemy for 80 minutes.

That’s the Munster Queensland will need if they’re to survive to a decider. That’s the Munster who is familiar to millions. Get the monkey slamming the cymbals, give it some sticks of dynamite and see what happens.

For the Maroons, Origin is more an art than a science, which is why they can overcome the odds and look their most dangerous when they’re wounded.

Their magic is real because they believe in it and that belief lives in Munster more than any other player of his time. It’s why he is the kind of guy Bruce Springsteen would write songs about if only the Boss was a Queenslander. 

For the Maroons to pick up the pieces from a game they’ll feel they never should have lost, they need Munster to go back to the well again and they will look to him to do it again and again until his final days in Origin, whenever that may be.

He will be in this team for as long as he wants and while there’s no suggestion the end is nigh, given he turns 32 in a few months we are getting to the point in his career where things will start to happen for the last time.

Origin II might be the first of those last times. The earliest there can be another game in Melbourne is the 2028 series, when Munster will be looking down the barrel of his 34th birthday.

He might never get this particular chance again, to bring together both who he is and always will be and what he’s become.

But as long as Queensland are in need of a hero and there are still boots on his feet and maroon on his back, they will look to Munster, just like they have since the very start when he was surrounded by men whose legend he would live up to.

He is so different from those early and furious days but for Queenslanders like him some things never change. What he has done will stand the test of time, even as his time is still now.