Jamal Fogarty’s length of the field try in the 76th minute of the 2019 Intrust Super Cup grand final will live on in Bears folklore and was a moment the players on the field will never forget.
The Bears already had a handy 12-point lead thanks to tries from Tyronne Roberts-Davis, Pat Politoni and a Kurtis Rowe double, but with the game on the line, the Wynnum Manly Seagulls were coming back and throwing everything they had at the Burleigh defence.
After scrambling to defend a handful of line breaks in the final stages, Fogarty held on to a Seagulls grubber kick and came out the other side with nobody in front of him.
He ran the remaining 90 metres to score the try that sealed Burleigh’s fourth Intrust Super Cup premiership as his teammates looked on with a range of emotions.
“I was absolutely stuffed and on my haunches, having just finished a set of six in defence, and Jamal regathered and broke through the line and I just had my hand in the air going ‘run Jamal! Run!'” Bears captain Luke Page said.
“I was stuck on the ten-metre line and he scored and from then I was just overwhelmed and brought to tears.”
Intrust Super Cup Grand Final Highlights: Wynnum v Bears
Page’s front row partner Jack Buchanan was similarly emotional, especially given he and his wife Madeleine had welcome daughter Harper into the world at 6.30am that same morning.
“I couldn’t move,” Buchanan said. “I was stuck on the ten-metre line and I couldn’t move, I was just that overwhelmed.
“It has been a massive 24 hours and I couldn’t have done it with a better bunch of blokes. I love them all.”
Fullback Kurtis Rowe was named man of the match for his own heroics, which included two tries, two try-saving tackles and a crucial bit of improvisation that saved a certain 40/20 in the second half.
It was his second premiership win with the club and as Fogarty streaked away, he found another dual premiership winner to embrace.
“When I saw Jamal take-off I just turned around and I had Schwassy (Hayden) behind me,” Rowe said. “I just gave him a big hug and said ‘yes, bro, we did it! It’s on!’”
As for the man himself, he was typically humble and just pleased that he was able to outrun the chasing Wynnum Manly defenders and embrace his teammates at the end.
“I think my little legs were getting speed wobbles,” Fogarty said. “And I saw the speed machine Edene Gebbie coming across and I thought ‘oh no, he’s got me!’ But I just kept going and I was quite surprised when I got there.
“It was good to top off a big week, but we don’t play rugby league for individual awards and I’m just going to celebrate this one with the boys.”
Fogarty’s match winner capped an incredible week that saw him win the Petero Civoniceva Medal for Intrust Super Cup player of the year on Friday night.
Coach Jimmy Lenihan often talks about the football gods, and he was beaming when talking about the rewards Fogarty has received this week.
“He deserves it. It almost makes me emotional just talking about it,” Lenihan said.
“For the amount of work, he puts into his game; you see a lot of young kids get paid a lot of money on their potential, but Jamal has worked through his potential and is now an even better player.
“He’s a great defensive player. He’s an organiser and game-manager. His natural skills still shine; his speed, his passing and his agility is fantastic.
“He is someone who really deserves an opportunity to play in a fulltime system. There is a lot of people getting paid a lot of money at a young age to do that, but he is right now somebody who is ready to fill in for anybody at a first-grade level and I’m sure once he gets his opportunity, he’ll prove his worth.”
