After years of searching, have the Blues found the icing on their cake?

The Blues hunt in packs.

Kezie Apps is a living legend sharing a scrum with back-row mainstays Yasmin Clydsdale and Olivia Kernick, both of whom refuse to leave the field.

Centres Isabelle Kelly and Jessica Sergis spend most of the game miles apart but always feel like a package deal.

But, for a team that has picked itself in so many positions over the years, the halves have been in constant flux.

For the past decade, Queensland have picked some combination of Ali Brigginshaw, Tarryn Aiken and/or Zehara Temara while NSW has named a new partnership every year, ultimately naming 11 different sixes and sevens in the same time Queensland has used five.

But in Thursday’s 32-12 win to kick off the 2025 State of Origin series, they appear to have struck on a special halves pairing.

Tiana Penitani-Gray, the Sharks captain and a centre by trade, didn’t kick the ball once but did her job as a running five-eighth, including a second-half line break.

She was praised by first-time Origin coach John Strange for her defensive work on opposite number Tarryn Aiken, and her experience in one of the most fast-twitch defensive positions in the game no doubt helped her corral superstar fullback Tamika Upton on a number of occasions.

It left Jesse Southwell to handle the play-making, which she made look so effortless that it’s easy to forget how young she is.

She’s still only 20 years old and yet her elevation feels belated because her talent has been so evident since her ascension as a teenager.

Her class with ball in hand was crucial in the series-opening win and her control with the boot ensured almost every NSW set had an ending befitting the six tackles that preceded it.

In the first set, after Brigginshaw booted out on the full with her first offering, Southwell showed the old hand how it’s done, with a tidy dink into the in-goal for a repeat set.

A few plays later the Blues opened the scoring through Jess Sergis.

Last year, halfback Rachael Pearson struggled particularly in the high-pressure decider in Newcastle, and it cost the Blues.

They dominated through the middle thanks to a forward pack led by gun props Millie Elliott and Caitlan Johnston, both of whom will miss the 2025 series while having children.

Strange replaced them with Caitlan’s sister, Ellie, who stormed over for a try on debut in very Caitlan fashion, and veteran middle Simaima Taufa, who has been playing rep footy for over a decade.

But while NSW corrected their issues and covered their losses, the Maroons appear to have a tougher task plugging up gaps in the middle.

Shannon Mato’s pregnancy means last year’s player of the series is missing from the Queensland forward pack, and her equally damaging offsider, Tazmin Rapana, has retired from representative football.

That’s a lot of impact to have in a podcast studio instead of a packed scrum.

Mato’s replacement, Keilee Joseph, made just 17 post-contact metres in her seven charges. Front-row partners Jessika Elliston and Lauren Brown took six hit-ups and missed six tackles respectively.

Without Mato and Rapana, Romy Teitzel was the only Queenslander who ran for over 100 metres, and most of that came after she was moved to the centres to cover for the concussed Jasmine Peters.

If none of the Maroons can find their front in a tackle, it won’t allow the likes of Aiken, Upton and Julia Robinson to “get their footy on”, as men’s coach Billy Slater is so fond of saying.

Queensland’s Origin folklore is almost entirely on a bedrock held together by welterweights taking on heavies, but the Blues peeled off every bit of paper and revealed a host of cracks that Tahnee Norris, Brigginshaw, Upton and Co have just two weeks to address.