{"id":335389,"date":"2023-10-01T13:16:24","date_gmt":"2023-10-01T13:16:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=335389"},"modified":"2023-10-01T14:01:23","modified_gmt":"2023-10-01T14:01:23","slug":"240k-broncos-freak-who-blew-hole-in-grand-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=335389","title":{"rendered":"$240k Broncos 'freak' who blew hole in grand final"},"content":{"rendered":"

The modern-day Panthers<\/a> empire was crumbling and Ezra Mam\ufeff, a 20-year-old on a contract worth just $240,000-a-season, was doing the demolition job.<\/p>\n

Scooting, stalling, jinking and accelerating, \ufeffthe flashy Brisbane playmaker threatened to rip the game away.<\/p>\n

With three dynamite touches in the space of 10 minutes early in the second half of Sunday night's NRL<\/a> grand final, Mam's magic came to the fore and propelled the Broncos<\/a> to a 24-8 lead.<\/p>\n

RECAP:<\/strong> All the updates from grand final day<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Reynolds labelled 'best buy in Broncos history'<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Gus reveals Walsh fear ahead of grand final<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

For a fleeting period, Brisbane's hat-trick hero was the toast of a stunned rugby league world\ufeff.<\/p>\n

Just over 20 minutes later, he lay in the middle of Accor Stadium and balled his eyes out, devastated that the Panthers, inspired by Nathan Cleary, had cancelled out his blitz in a come-from-behind 26-24 victory<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But\ufeff so stunning a raid did the young Queenslander carve out in the opening exchanges of the second half that, even amid the Panthers' three-peat celebrations, it's deserving of acknowledgement.<\/p>\n

\"Ezra<\/p>\n

As a host of Panthers players and rugby league greats marvelled at the grand final classic, acknowledgement was exactly what Mam got.\ufeff<\/p>\n

"Shout-out to Ezra Mam … You're a freak," Cleary said after receiving the Clive Churchill Medal.<\/p>\n

"It was dire straits there. It was the Ezra Mam show for a period\ufeff of that second half and it was dire straits," Isaah Yeo remarked.<\/p>\n

"\ufeffWe were up straight after half-time and then Ezra Mam just scored a hat-trick in five, 10 minutes, bro," Sunia Turuva added.<\/p>\n

"I think that's what unlocked Clez [Cleary]. It got him to do his thing and then next thing you know he's putting on the Clive Churchill [Medal]."<\/p>\n

\"Cleary's<\/p>\n

Tasked with dealing out votes, Billy Slater saved two for Mam.<\/p>\n

"I thought he was tremendous," said the Queensland State of Origin coach.<\/p>\n

"He blew the game right open in the second half. Through his speed he took on Lindsay Smith on the outside and showed elite speed to get to the try line. He put his Broncos in front and then extended the lead with another couple of tries. He was outstanding, Ezra Mam."\ufeff<\/p>\n

Mam is one of several Broncos youngsters turning heads at rival clubs and he was already set for a massive pay rise when his next contract negotiation is settled.<\/p>\n

Based on his grand final heroics alone, the $240k five-eighth may soon be the NRL's next million-dollar man.\ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The modern-day Panthers empire was crumbling and Ezra Mam\ufeff, a 20-year-old on a contract worth just $240,000-a-season, was doing the demolition job. Scooting, stalling, jinking […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":335391,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335389"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=335389"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335389\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":335393,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335389\/revisions\/335393"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/335391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=335389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=335389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=335389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}