The Wests Tigers have celebrated Robbie Farah’s 250th game for the club with a stunning 22-6 upset of NRL leaders South Sydney.
Arguably the best Tigers performance of the year not only brought the Rabbitohs’ nine-game winning streak to a halt and put a dampener on John Sutton’s 300th NRL game milestone, but also kept the joint venture’s finals ambitions alive.
The impressive victory in front of a strong crowd of 25,963 on Saturday night lifts the Tigers to within four points of the top eight with six games remaining.
Farah, playing against the Rabbitohs for the first time since his mid-season switch in June, left the field in a medicab following a head clash with George Burgess in the 71st minute.
Tigers coach Ivan Cleary was delighted with the way his team overcame five head injury assessments (HIAs) to keep the league’s best attack to their lowest score of the season.
“It was a really good 80-minute performance (on) both sides of the ball, I thought,” Cleary said.
“With a bunch of HIAs at regular occurrences throughout the second half, players went in different spots, we were still able to hold our defence together.
“Attack got a bit out of whack but that was probably understandable. Against obviously a very good attacking side who throw plenty at you, I thought we handled them pretty well.”
For the Rabbitohs, the heavy defeat opens the door for defending premiers Melbourne or St George Illawarra to move to the top of the table by the end of the round.
Down 10-0 at halftime, the Rabbitohs had a number of looks at reducing the deficit in the second half but were turned away by a Tigers defence reminiscent of their early-season form.
A Moses Mbye try extended the lead to 16 but it wasn’t until Corey Thompson’s 80m intercept try in the 67th minute that an impressive win was sealed.
Rabbitohs five-eighth Cody Walker nabbed a consolation try to avoid their first scoreless effort in more than two years.
The early signs pointed to boilover at ANZ Stadium, with Esan Marsters crashing over in the eighth minute following huge runs from the Tigers’ forwards.
Sam Burgess tried hard to inspire his teammates with some crunching hits, including a jolting stop on Farah that was put on report despite minor contact to the head.
However, the Tigers continued to absorb the pressure before turning the heat back on their opponents through David Nofoaluma’s diving effort for a 10-point lead at halftime.
Rabbitohs coach Anthony Seibold conceded his team were simply outplayed.
“I’m not a massive believer in having to lose a game to learn but the Wests Tigers were far better than us tonight. They beat us in most areas of the game, to be fair,” he said.
Sutton reached the 300-game milestone for the cardinal and myrtle – the first player in the 110-year history of the foundation club to do so.