So the other day was officially 20 years after we were crowned minor premiers when we defeated Brisbane in the final round of the 2005 regular season. It almost feels like yesterday 2005 and in some ways with Canberra winning the minor premiership this season it reminded me a lot of 2005. Last year Canberra didn't make the finals and this year nothing was really expected of them. Same with us, in 2004 we missed the finals, in 2005 we recruited some good players like Tahu, Morrison, Riddell, Marsh but I don't think many would have predicted we finish first.
We also had Tim Smith who probably had the best rookie season in modern times where he recorded 40 try assists which nobody has achieved before or since. I remember when we were on the Footy Show and Peter Sterling handed him a jersey and annointed him as his successor. I also look at the top 8 that year and we basically beat all the teams around us, sometimes twice. I remember the top of the table match against St. George where we put 40 on them at Parramatta Stadium. 2005 was the last year that I truly believed in this club and their ability to win a premiership. Ever since I have had doubts in my mind whether we could win, especially in 2009 and 2022, I had doubts but with 2005 I believed in the team 100% and I thought it was our moment, our time. Of course I respected the opposition but when I watched the preliminary final between Wests and St. George the night before I said to myself "Well St. George were meant to make it to the grand final and be our opponent and now their gone". We had beaten Wests Tigers twice that year and we were one of the only teams who seemed to work out how to stop them.
I remember attending the preliminary final against North Queensland and there was 45,000 people in the stadium. 44,500 were Parramatta fans, maybe only about 200-300 NQ fans were in the ground. I knew that it would be a tough game but I thought to myself "These were beaten by 50 two weeks ago by Wests". I remember the game pretty well, nothing worked at all, the team looked flat on the pitch. Tim Smith even tried one of his cross field kicks which usually worked but it went over Grothe's head and into touch. I remember after the game and leaving the stadium, I saw one or two people saying they were going to burn their jersey. The train ride home was the quietest train ride I have ever expierenced in my life, it were like someone had died, nobody said a word. When I got home I listened to the radio and there were a few angry Parramatta fans that phoned up who wanted the team hung, drawn and quartered. The following week I watched the grand final and it was hard to watch at times because I thought "That should be us" and then I rememebered that we beat Wests twice that year.
I think as a club we have missed a lot of opportunities at winning more than four premierships, 1976, 1977, 1984, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2009 were some of the other ones, probably in more modern times 2001 obviously but 2005 gets overlooked by the casual rugby league fan, I think it was a seriously missed opportunity. There were some good memories from that year like beating Canterbury-Bankstown by 50 points which is the biggest ever win by either club over the other but it will always be a what if year.
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You have a point. 2001 you had Canterbury and Brisbane too who were top tier teams. 05' we finished 1st we 8 losses. These days that amount of losses gets you 3-5 on the ladder. Tigers v Cowboys GF showed how week of a year 2005 was in the comp.
Im think it's going to be a Canberra storm grand final Canberra to win
Yep 2005 still haunts me as a 12 year old kid that game was heartbreaking.
I was at that NQ game. Terrible. I was also at Lang Park earlier in the season when we were 42-0 down at halftime to Brisbane. At least the weather was good that day. I was also at that Wests vs NQ semi where NQ got flogged. How they managed to turn it around still amazes me.
You are right though, as the season unfolded, it became more and more likely the premiership was ours to lose, although I think St George Illawarra had a better side. As soon as Wests beat St George in the porelim, we should have gone on to win it.
I remember towards the back end of the season we played St. George in a top of the table clash at Parramatta Stadium and we put 40 on them so I weren't too concerned about their side to be fair. I think it were after that game where I went "This is it, I have no doubts in my mind at all that we can win the whole thing".
Just coming back to.me now, I remember thinking if we played the first game of fhe weekend we would have won. Yeah, for sure, I think a lot of fans were saying the same back then. Basically, with St george losing the players got too excited and forgot to play it one game at a time.
That was a really shit day for me, I remeber it well. The girls basketball team I coached lost their Grandfinal - up by 3 in the last 30 seconds and loosing by a point, My team in the Grandfinal in the afternoon, loosing a triple overtime game by a point, and then settling in at the pub with all of my mates, all knowing I am a passionate eels supporter and watching them get flogged 29 to zip, didn't I cop some shit. Went home cracked a burbon and had a cry for 30 mins and when to bed waking up with the old adage - Next year............
Some great stories/memories in here. I asked Hindmarsh at one of his Fletch and Hindy pub events once which was the one he considered as the one that got away out of 01, 05 and 09. He didn't hesitate and said 01.
I remember being broken after the 05 Prelim. 07 was also a pretty good year. Losing to Melbourne in a Prelim.
For me I also don't think 2017 gets discussed enough. We were the only team to even compete with Melbourne in the finals that year. We went down there week 1 and lost by 2 points after some really bad calls. I reckon we fully threw everything at that game with plans on having the week off. When it didn't happen we couldn't recover. Few injuries etc didn't help. But, I still reckon if we won that game week 1, we win the grand final. We would have had a week off, then a home prelim against Brisbane who were broken and got smashed by Melbourne. The the Cowboys also got smashed by Melbourne in the GF. Well, maybe we wouldn't have beaten Melbourne in the GF, But, I think we were a lot closer that year than people remember.
2017 was a really good year where nobody expected much from us after 2016. We had a good squad but the psychological damage and everything attached to 2016 could have torn the playing group apart. If we had beaten NQ in that elimination sem-final we would have played Easts at the SFS and it would have been a sell out. Considering how Easts played on the night I reckon if we had got there we would have won too just like NQ did.
Hindmarsh and Fui Fui were massive outs for the game against the Cowboys. Fui Fui's go forward and Hindmarsh being the rock of the team. It just wasn't meant to be.
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