The Medal That Drove Brent Tate Back to Origin
- FOGS
- Oct 21
- 5 min read
Updated: Nov 19
The FOGS Dick “Tosser” Turner Medal will forever hold prestige but for Queensland legend Brent Tate it was his Holy Grail.
Tate, who played 23 State of Origin games at wing and centre for Queensland in a stellar career, held the medal in such awe that it was his driving force to get back in the Origin arena when others thought his Maroons days were over. At the end of the 2008 series Tate had played 15 Origin games and was one of the first picked in the team.
Then multiple ACL ruptures struck him down in his prime and he was absent from the Queensland side until 2012.
FOGS "Tosser" Turner medal, recognising 20 Origin games for Queensland, kept him believing.
Turner was the godfather of the Maroons and the Redcliffe Dolphins club where he had been a player, coach and club president. Tate, a Redcliffe junior, was in awe of a man who had done so much for Queensland.
“When I was at the Warriors I can remember walking around Mt Smart Stadium for hours and hours doing my rehab with no-one else around me,” Tate recalled.
“That drove me through all of my rehab. When you can say that you played 20 Origins, I just thought that came with a real sense of esteem. I don’t mean elitism. It comes with real gravitas and weight behind it.
“I remember in 2006 when Mal Meninga brought Tosser back into camp we all realised what a giant shadow he had cast over Origin.
“Mal understood all the things Tosser had done to keep Origin going. He held him in such high regard. It took me a few years to understand how he had looked after the playing group but once I understood the gravitas he had, it made me more desperate to get that medal.”
Tate did get back in the Maroons side in 2012 and he did finally get the prized medal the following year. That is a story in itself, but it all started in Origin footy off the bench in Sydney for the dashing outside back in 2002 when he was just 20 years old.
WEIRD AND WONDERFUL DEBUT
“I had only played 14 NRL games for the Broncos and suddenly Wayne Bennett had picked me to play Origin,” Tate said.
“It was a whirlwind and happened so quick. I was not nervous during the week.
“It was a weird game. We drew it (18-all) with a late try to Dane Carlaw and even though we retained the Origin shield there was no real celebration.”
Tate recalls not being sure if one of his Broncos teammates was impersonating a selector when he got the call-up.
“I remember Gene Miles rang to tell me I was in the team. At the time we had Gordie Tallis, Alfie Langer and those kind of guys at the Broncos and they could pull some horrible tricks on the young guys,” Tate chuckled.
“I went into camp to get the medicals. It was in those days where you’d get on the bed and there would be 50-odd cameras pointing at you while you are in your jocks.
“I was still unsure if it was real. We still had Alfie playing and just training with a guy like that, I couldn’t believe what was going on.”
2006 HEROICS THE TURNING POINT
The ensuing three years were not kind to the Maroons as NSW went onto win the 2003-2005 series. Tate was dropped and did not play in 2005 but got a recall under new coach Meninga in 2006.
Then came a moment in the decider in 2006 in Melbourne that he is famous for. The Maroons trailed 14-4 with nine minutes to go. Deep in their own territory, Johnathan Thurston made a break and Tate, playing centre, knew where he had to be.
“JT had his classic show-and-go to get through but his pass to me had to be millimetre perfect because I was at full tilt when I ran onto the ball … and I needed to be to get to the tryline. It was a peach of a pass and I put the hammer down,” Tate recalled.
Tate brought the ball under the goal posts and slammed it down.
“When I did that the thought in my mind was ‘here we come, we are not done yet’,” he said.
Minutes later Darren Lockyer swooped on a loose Brett Hodgson pass to secure a memorable 16-14 victory and series win. When Tate scored it was as though he knew the Maroons would prevail.
“I genuinely did. I get goose bumps talking about it,” he said.
Not only did it save a lot of careers but it kick-started eight consecutive series wins in the famous Maroons dynasty.
“Going into that match we’d had a lot of change,” Tate said.
“Rhys Wesser was in the team for his fourth Origin game. Clinton Schifcofske and Adam Mogg were playing their second.
“I had played a few more games and I looked at it as a night where I really had to own the backline and play well in a decider.
“That decider in Melbourne was my favourite night of football hands down."
“I look back at 2006 as the virtual start of my Origin career. I had obviously played before that and gone OK but I had never dominated or had the belief to dominate. That series Mal gave me the belief that I could go out and own it. I played wing and centre but I liked to think I could still influence a game.”
THE COMEBACK AND BENNETT’S CALL
At the start of 2012 Tate was playing well in Cowboys colours and he was fit and healthy. After three injury-riddled seasons he was on the cusp of an incredible Origin recall. When Cowboys football boss Peter Parr rung before Origin 1 it was a dream come true.
“I’d landed back in Townsville after an away game and there had been a bit of talk about me getting back in the team. I listened to my voicemail and it was Peter Parr letting me know,” Tate said.
Tate returned to the Origin arena in Melbourne, his happy hunting ground. So it proved again in a tight 18-10 win.
“That was my second favourite Origin from a personal point of view,” Tate recalled.
“It was a night Billy Slater had an off night under the high ball and I took the responsibility under the bombs on the wing because I knew it was going to be coming. I did a lot of work during the week.
“I remember I got a message from Wayne Bennett the morning after the game. I’ll never forget."
Wayne said that to come back after all I’d gone through.. he just couldn't believe it.
“It was one of those moments where I knew I’d done a good job. There had been a lot of dark days. I’d done three ACLs by that time.”
Tate was picked for the next seven Origins, including the decider in 2013 when he was man of the match in the eighth series win on the trot for the Maroons. In game two of that series he reached the magic 20-game Origin mark and received his beloved medal.
FINALE IN ‘MOST LOVED’ JERSEY
Tate’s final game for Queensland, and last match of rugby league ever, was in game two of the 2014 series in Sydney when he ruptured an ACL for the fourth time. The Maroons lost that match and the series.
“I remember someone telling me that fairytales were only in children’s books. I didn’t get the fairytale finish but I look back at the fact my last game of football was in a jersey I honestly would have laid my life on the line for,” Tate said.
“I cherished it. I finished playing at the top of my game in a jersey I loved the most.”
Tate retired without playing another game after he received medical advice that coming back from a fourth serious knee injury would be a bridge too far.
The 2006 premiership winner was contracted to the Cowboys for 2015 but had pulled the pin a year before their maiden triumph.
“In one regard I didn’t really want to play that 2014 Origin series. I remember thinking I would retire from rep footy but I loved playing for Queensland so much I couldn’t say no,” Tate said.
“I signed a two-year contract and I was hoping Greeny (Cowboys coach Paul Green) was going to tell me he didn’t want me to play Origin anymore, but he bloody didn’t.
“My gut was telling me one thing but my head was telling me something else. It was like Tosser Turner always said. You have got a duty to Queensland and when the call comes you have got to answer it.”
