League: Australia avenge Tri-Nations defeat

Kangaroos 50 Kiwis 12

Australia tonight avenged the loss of their Tri-Nations title by overwhelming New Zealand 50-12 in the Anzac rugby league test in Brisbane.

The Kangaroos scored eight tries to two at Suncorp Stadium, with winger Timana Tahu and skipper Darren Lockyer each getting a brace.

Champion halfback Andrew Johns, in his final test in the green and gold jumper, was in fine goalkicking form, kicking three sideline conversions among his eight goals.

The Kiwis couldn't be faulted for effort and uncompromising defence, but they were undone by the home side's incisive attacks down the flanks and by some mistakes at key times.

The result continued Australia's dominance in the Queensland capital, where they have not been beaten by their New Zealand in 19 years.

The Kiwis suffered a late setback with inspirational skipper Ruben Wiki failing a fitness test on his hamstring strain. He was replaced by Parramatta and former test skipper Nathan Cayless.

In another change to the starting 13, livewire half Benji Marshall, returning from a shoulder injury, started on the bench, coming on at the half-hour mark.

Fellow young star Sonny Bill Williams was in the run-on side as advertised, operating initially in the centres.

While their inclusion together for the first time in a Kiwis team produced plenty of anticipation, neither player could provide the spark for a comeback.

The match -- before 44,191 spectators, a record for a transtasman test in Queensland, and largest for a contest between the two countries in Australia since 1963 -- began as a tough arm wrestle, with the Kiwis' defence brutal at times.

The Kiwis gave New Zealand-born Australian fullback Karmichael Hunt, 19, a particularly torrid reception when he returned the ball.

Hunt was later taken off on a cart 10 minutes into the second half when Frank Pritchard hit Hunt's head with the shoulder in his first tackle off the bench.

Pritchard, who was among the New Zealanders to offer a pre-match jibe at the former Aucklander's decision to opt for Australia, was put on report.

The Kangaroos opened the scoring with an early Johns penalty, but the Kiwis struck back on the quarter hour on the back of the first mistake of the match.

Hunt threw a wild pass just out from his line, which winger Matt King just managed to grasp, but then had the ball stripped from him by opposite Tame Tupou, making his test debut.

Two plays later, the Kiwis thought they had scored, but the other New Zealand new cap, second rower David Fa'alogo was held up just short of the line.

However, from the same attack, halfback Thomas Leuluai produced a great ball to send second rower David Kidwell through a big hole and over.

From there, however, Australia, started to work the ball wide to get around the heavy traffic in the middle, began to take control of proceedings.

They spend significant periods in New Zealand territory, and were rewarded from a repeat set, when they created a huge overlap for centre Matt Cooper to stroll over.

Worse was to come for the Kiwis when they lost the ball on their own 10m line and from the turnover centre Mark Gasnier got between two tacklers to force his way over.

Johns was unable to add the extras this time, but a penalty minutes later pulled Australia out to an eight-point lead.

Webb then landed his first goal late in the half to reduce the score the margin to 14-6 at halftime.

But Australia moved further ahead five minutes after the restart. At the end of a sweeping attack, Johns produced a superb cut-out pass to put winger Timana Tahu over in the corner.

Minutes later, Tahu turned from hero to villain to gift Williams a try. He palmed Marshall's cross-kick into the in-goal to Hunt, only to see the ball go to loose.

Australia struck back after Pritchard's tackle on Hunt, when Nathan Hindmarsh scored down the wing vacated while Jake Webster was down with injury.

They tried their hand down the same flank shortly after and it was Tahu who benefitted for his second touchdown.

Lockyer and hooker Danny Buderus added further tries to confirm the Kangaroos' dominance.

They added insult to injury by giving lock Ben Kennedy, also playing his last test for Australia, the simple conversion of Buderus' try.

Lockyer's second try added the icing for the Kangaroos.

Stand-in Kiwis captain Nigel Vagana blamed costly errors and too many rushes of blood to the head.

"Pretty disappointed, the effort was there but we just coughed up too much ball, did too much tackling and that cost us in the last 15 minutes," he told Sky TV.

"We always play with passion and I think we might have played with a bit too much today.

"We played with our hearts instead of our heads and it probably came back to bite us."

Lockyer was confident when the Kangaroos had the lead after a torrid first half.

"We just had too much firepower. It was a very physical game, you saw some of the hits out there," he said.

"New Zealand were a bit wounded, they had a few injuries, so to their credit I think they did very well."

- NZPA