Canberra Raiders 18
It was nearly two years in the making, but North Queensland finally registered back-to-back NRL wins with a 26-18 victory over Canberra in Townsville on Saturday night.
The Raiders came back strong after a bleak first half, when the hosts led 24-6 and looked to be cruising towards their third success at Dairy Farmers Stadium this year.
A combination of North Queensland jitters and a improved showing from the Raiders saw the game go to the wire.
Cowboys fullback Matt Bowen was the hero in the dying stages, producing a fine cover tackle on Daniel Vidot with three minutes to play to put the winger into touch just short of the line.
Canberra's only answer to a confident and free-flowing Cowboys' performance in the opening stanza was to find ways to make the bad even worse.
Their first two restarts from North Queensland tries gave possession right back to the hosts.
The Green Machine was also left to nurse a few self-imposed bruises with Joel Thompson left groggy after Blake Ferguson clattered into his teammate's head when Scott Bolton crashed over for the Cowboys' second try in the 16th minute.
Ferguson then darted over for a try to reduce the deficit, but undid all of his good work playing the ball into no-man's land, allowing Johnathan Thurston to bolt from dummy half to extend the lead to 24-6 at halftime.
North Queensland centurion Glenn Hall made his milestone game one to savour, collecting a ricocheting Thurston kick, before showing his power to barge through a flatfooted defence to score.
Canberra wonderkid Sam Williams, in just his second game, kicked impressively for the spring-heeled Jarrod Croker to open the scoring in the second half, reducing the advantage to 12 points.
But the revival was stalled when Williams was sinbinned for a professional foul on Kalifa Faifai-Loa when the Cowboy made an impressive break.
Thurston lined up to give North Queensland a buffer with a penalty goal with 15 minutes remaining.
Canberra managed to regather and cut the margin back to eight when Ferguson finished a finely crafted attack with his second try in the 71st minute.
North Queensland 26 (S Bolton G Hall J Thurston A Winterstein tries J Thurston 5 goals) bt Canberra 18 (B Ferguson 2 S Fensom tries J Croker 3 goals) at Dairy Farmers Stadium. Referee: Gavin Badger, Steve Lyons. Crowd: 10,741.
- AAP
