![\"Alex](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/36ebc5cb532ff62a3373130760ba6ad50535b32b.webp\")
Alex Johnston beats Jesse Arthars to score the first of his four tries on Thursday night.Getty Images<\/p>\nSouth Sydney 48, Brisbane 6<\/p>\n
Two things were guaranteed at Accor Stadium on Thursday night \u2013 Jai Arrow would leave everyone in tears before kick-off and Alex Johnston would score a few tries.<\/p>\n
The sight of Arrow crying pre-game was one of the saddest images you will see this year.<\/p>\n
Arrow revealed last month he was battling motor neurone disease and had to immediately retire from playing. The public support he has since received has been overwhelming \u2013 and the scenes involving the two NRL clubs where he started his career and then prematurely finished it were always going to be moving.<\/p>\n
Arrow walked out to a guard of honour featuring the Broncos and Souths players, and when it came time to ringing the Bunnies\u2019 legacy bell, he embraced his family and began to cry. It was tough to watch.<\/p>\n
The Bunnies wore all white with \u2018Arrow\u2019 written across the back of every jersey. The Broncos also acknowledged the forward on their own playing strip, which will be auctioned, and all money raised donated to Arrow and his family. For a few minutes, rugby league and results meant little.<\/p>\n
The sombre mood, however, had become a celebration by the end of the night when Johnston finished with four tries as Souths thumped the premiers 48-6.<\/p>\n
Alex Johnston beats Jesse Arthars to score the first of his four tries on Thursday night.Getty Images<\/p>\n
Johnston boosted his season total to 19 tries in 12 games, leaving him just one behind Penrith\u2019s Tom Jenkins, who leads the competition with 20 tries in 13 appearances.<\/p>\n
The PNG Chiefs-bound flyer was at the centre of wild scenes at Allianz Stadium this year when he passed the late Ken Irvine\u2019s long-standing record of 212 tries. Who knows if Johnston\u2019s record will ever be broken.<\/p>\n
If Johnston\u2019s fourth try late in the game was popular with the hearty souls who made their way to Sydney Olympic Park, so was the debutant John Radel\u2019s four-pointer.<\/p>\n
As for Brisbane, they will not win the competition and will be flat out making the finals. They have now lost six on the trot, and face the Roosters, Cronulla and competition favourites Penrith in the next month.<\/p>\n
To make matters worse, skipper Adam Reynolds was forced off the field about the hour mark with a left hamstring injury.<\/p>\n
As former Rabbitoh Reynolds came from the field, to a standing ovation by some of the Souths\u2019 faithful, fellow half Ezra Mam left the field with a right shoulder complaint.<\/p>\n
They look a shell of the side that went on the rampage last September.<\/p>\n
A respected ex-NRL club captain strolled into the press box at Accor Stadium at half-time and spoke about the Broncos wanting to take short cuts and falling short in the effort areas. Being the hunted every week had clearly caught up with them, said the former skipper.<\/p>\n
Injuries and Origin duty were always going to make life tough for the visitors, but Souths had their own impressive list of players unavailable, including Latrell Mitchell, who is due back from a back injury after the bye round.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"South Sydney 48, Brisbane 6 Two things were guaranteed at Accor Stadium on Thursday night \u2013 Jai Arrow…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":730163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-730162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/730162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=730162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/730162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/730163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=730162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=730162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=730162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}