Queensland Maroons captain Cameron Munster has opened up about his halftime exchange with referee Ashley Klein during the deciding match of the 2026 State of Origin series.
The experienced whistleblower, in his 23rd Origin, hasn't been far away from the headlines throughout this series, and Munster made sure that would continue when he confronted Klein following a frustrating first half which saw the Maroons head into the sheds trailing by 14 points.
“I just wanna know, there's been some calls mate, that I think have warranted being 10 in the bin,” Munster was heard saying on the Channel Nine broadcast to Klein.
"We haven't got the rub of the green; I know they're 50/50s."
Klein stopped Munster abruptly, telling him it was a matter of opinion.
Munster, quizzed post-game, said he was trying to get some questions answered by Klein.
"I just had some questions around certain things that were getting around the game," Munster said during the post-match press conference on his halftime conversation.
"At the end of the day, we didn't ice our moments. It was a bit of frustration, probably from myself just asking Ash some questions, but he saw them a little bit differently to myself, and he adjudicates the game the way he sees it, and that's how he saw it."
The mood of the Maroons wouldn't have improved in the second half when Jack Bostock appeared to knock on in the air before Bradman Best ran the best part of 100 metres to score at the other end.
Coach Billy Slater said it would have been tough for him to comment on the decision.
"We didn't get a clear look at it up in the box, so it would be hard for me to comment, but things didn't go our way. Things didn't go our way, but the team fought after that, so it is what it is," Slater said on the try.
The NRL bunker officials reportedly had a different view of the incident from a camera angle that didn't appear on the broadcast, proving Bostock had not touched the ball; however, the public has not yet seen those images.
Speaking on the loss, Munster said moments flipped the game, with two of them involving refereeing decisions - the Best try, and Max Plath being ruled as offside, although he stopped short of criticising either decision.
"There is always a lot of pressure in big games. At the end of the day, you have to be able to harness that pressure, and I felt like we did that, but there were a couple of moments. The Bradman Best try, a couple of times we knocked the ball on in our own end," Munster said.
"We gave them a chance in that first half; they scored a lot of points, and it's very hard to get that back in the second half, especially the way we played the game. We had two back-to-back errors in the first couple of sets of the second half that put us on the back foot.
"At times, we fought hard, got back into the game. Plath being offside, if he is onside there, it's a try, and we are down six. Who knows what happens."
Queensland have now lost three straight games in Brisbane.
