Chris Sandow kicked a 51-metre golden point field goal to hand South Sydney a 21-20 NRL win over Sydney Roosters on Saturday night.
One point rarely makes a season but, in the case of Chris Sandow's 51-metre golden-point effort against Sydney Roosters on Saturday night, it may well have saved South Sydney's 2011 NRL campaign.
Sandow broke a 20-all deadlock seven minutes into extra time to extinguish the Roosters' flickering finals hopes and in the process breathe life into the Rabbitohs' top-eight ambitions after a resilient effort at ANZ Stadium.
Despite his heroics, the Parramatta-bound playmaker refused to speak to media after the game, Sandow instead leaving it up to coach John Lang to sing his praises.
"We play games where there's a lot of field goal kicking and I've seen him hit them from halfway plenty of times at training," Lang said.
"He will stand there and go 'crack'.
"I knew he could do it, but to do it under pressure like that is a different thing."
Roosters' skipper Braith Anasta, who has his own field goal wonder-moment to savour from last year's finals series, admitted the one-pointer was a tough blow to take.
"I was in front of him - as soon as he hit it, you can tell as a kicker when it comes off the middle," Anasta said.
"I didn't even want to turn around because I knew it was going over."
Lang knew the importance of the win to his side's finals hopes.
"In the end, you've got to start winning some games," Lang said.
"It's hard to go forward if you keep getting beaten.
"We needed the two points desperately."
The Rabbitohs never really looked like they were on top until the game went to golden point. They had scratched and clawed to stay in the contest, but it seemed the Roosters had their measure with halves Mitchell Pearce and Todd Carney posing plenty of problems.
But, as has been the case all year for the tri-colours, something was missing, as they paid the price for an off night with the boot for Carney, having scored four tries to the Rabbitohs' three.
"I don't know if there's a nice way to lose in professional sport but these golden point losses are all gut-busting for the team on the wrong end," Roosters' coach Brian Smith said.
The Roosters opened the scoring via Kane Linnett but lost the advantage via a soft try to Issac Luke soon after.
Three straight sets on their own line proved too much for the Rabbitohs to cope with, as Shaun Kenny-Dowall crossed for what proved to be a 10-6 halftime lead.
The Roosters were livid at what they thought was a forward pass when Dylan Farrell scored just after the restart, Sandow's sideline conversion giving the home side their first lead of the game.
But a double to Sam Perrett looked like it had secured back-to-back wins for the Roosters, especially when Nate Myles brilliantly kicked the ball as Nathan Merritt was just about to score six minutes from time.
It was to no avail, however, with Greg Inglis crashing over to send the game to extra time.
Anasta along with Sandow and Merritt all missed field goal attempts before the cheeky No.7 nailed the match-winner.
