Its been six years since the Bulldogs last defeated the Broncos at Suncorp Stadium, but wasn't it a performance from the boys from Belmore in round 14 of the 2009 season.
The Bulldogs took advantage of a tiring Broncos outfit to run away with a 44-22 victory at Suncorp Stadium on Friday.
Scores were locked at 22-all early in the second half but a week without training took its toll on Brisbane as their defence fell apart in the last 20 minutes.
“That’s a massive win. The Broncos never give up and always fight back so the boys worked really hard for that win,” said prop Ben Hannant, who finished with an impressive 16 runs and 35 tackles.
Josh Morris, Bryson Goodwin and Hazem el Masri all grabbed doubles for the blue-and-whites while El Masri finished with a personal haul of 20 points.
Man-of-the-match Ben Roberts put in a commanding performance at five-eighth, playing a role in a number of the Dogs’ tries while pushing off Darren Lockyer to score one himself in the 55th minute.
“Kevvie (coach Kevin Moore) gave us a bit of a kick in the guts at halftime. He told us to get back to basics in the second half and it came good,” Roberts said.
His decisive solo try opened the floodgates as the Bulldogs ran in another three unanswered tries in the final quarter of the game.
Earlier the Bulldogs had skipped away to a 10-0 lead courtesy of an early double to Brett Morris.
However the Broncos hit back – benefiting from the boot and then a one-arm offload of Karmichael Hunt to see Jharal Yow Yeh and Lagi Setu register tries.
The Dogs thought they’d secured the halftime advantage when Hazem El Masri crossed in the 34th minute but got caught on their heels as the hooter sounded.
Broncos replacement Ashton Sims crashed over from close-range and the Dogs found themselves behind 16-18 at the break.
Winger Goodwin scored his tenth try of the season when he latched on to a Roberts grubber three minutes into the second half.
His opposing wing Yow Yeh stretched out for his second six minutes later to draw the Broncos level.
But from there the Bulldogs took charge through tries to Hodgson, Goodwin (his eleventh of the season) and a runaway intercept to El Masri.
While Roberts was a constant threat in attack, David Stagg was yet again immense in defence – racking up 45 tackles to go with his 13 runs.
