NEIL HENRY was the dominant voice in Queensland's coaching box last night, directing the plays and calling the shots.

Sitting to his right was Maroons coach Mal Meninga, who was flanked on the other side by injured playmaker Darren Lockyer. The softly-spoken Meninga offered scattered advice throughout the match, while Henry screamed instructions through his headset to team assistant Steve Walters on the sideline bench.

It was an unusual dynamic - the assistant seemingly more in command than the man he was assisting. There has been talk during the past two years that Henry is highly rated by the Queensland set-up and has had much more to do with their success than what is perceived beyond their dressing rooms.

It was evident in the way he saw what NSW were planning before their first try, as they subtly stacked the short side.

"A lot of numbers, how many? Seven? Eight?" Henry said. NSW spread it through the hands and scored the opening try in the corner in the fourth minute. "We've got to have line speed that doesn't sit and leave the line open," Henry barked into his headset as the Maroons gathered behind the posts.

Henry knew his halfback, Johnathan Thurston, was making far too many tackles. "JT's got to think about pushing out the two spot to have a rest. Get outside GI [Greg Inglis]."

The most consistent call from Henry throughout the contest was to target new Blues halfback Peter Wallace, who had racked up 29 tackles by the end of 80 minutes.

"We need to think about targeting Wallace," Henry said 10 minutes into the game. "Go in and then go back at him. Message to Sam [Thaiday] and GI, go to Wallace."

Then later, as Thaiday tired, Henry told Walters to put on Jacob Lillyman and instructed the Cowboys back-rower to "look for Wallace".

After a long break in the second half failed to yield a try - a Nate Myles pass in traffic was intercepted by Danny Buderus - Henry sighed: "There's opportunities, we've got to be thinking support when we carry."

As time slipped away - along with Queensland's hopes - Meninga became more agitated. When centre Justin Hodges jumped into dummy-half and attempted to run but was immediately swamped, Meninga groaned: "Oh, get out of there."

Meninga was then angered when defenders failed to put pressure on Wallace as he went to kick the ball on the last tackle near Queensland's line: "Pressure, pressure, come on PJ [Marsh]! F---ing hell!"

After the game, forwards Petero Civoniceva and Myles lamented that the team had not followed the gameplan, but would not say what that plan was. "We probably tried to play a bit too lateral, rather than work it up the middle," Civoniceva said. "In the end, our execution wasn't good enough."

Myles added: "We just didn't stick to the gameplan that Mal and Neil Henry wanted us to do. That was probably the best they've played in the last two years … we expected that with Craig Bellamy coming in."