It was played on the night of Sunday, 2 October at Sydney's Telstra Stadium between the Wests Tigers and North Queensland Cowboys, with both clubs making their grand final debuts.

The two teams had met three times during the season, with North Queensland winning by 44–20 in round six, though the Wests Tigers went in having won the previous two, including a 50–6 victory in the first week of the finals series.

[2] Airline Qantas added an extra two flights and the Townsville Bulletin newspaper chartered a Boeing 747 to take North Queensland fans to their team's first grand final.

[3] Wests Tigers winger Pat Richards was in doubt for the match with a fractured ankle that eventually required six pain-killing injections for him to take place in the team, defying medical opinion.

[6] Television coverage of the match was provided by Nine's Wide World of Sports with commentary from Ray Warren, Peter Sterling, Paul Vautin, Phil Gould, Matthew Johns, Andrew Voss and Ben Ikin.

North Queensland winger Ty Williams crossed the Wests Tigers try-line in the 23rd minute, but the video referee ruled no try due to an obstruction in back play.

[12] Richards palmed off a North Queensland defender as he ran the remaining 20 metres to dive over and score,[13] finishing one of the most famous grand final plays in history.

Ten minutes later North Queensland were attacking the Wests try line when Thurston, 10 metres out flicked the ball back to Travis Norton who charged over to score.

A few minutes later though, the North Queensland side were down close to the Wests Tigers try line where their half-back Johnathan Thurston threw a cut out pass to Matt Sing to score on the right wing.

[20] Seconds before the final siren the Wests Tigers got one more try when Hodgson, from ten metres out, put a grubber kick into North Queensland's in-goal area for Todd Payten to dive onto.

[22] Wests Tigers captain Scott Prince, himself from North Queensland, was awarded the Clive Churchill Medal as man-of-the-match[23] before being presented with the premiership trophy by Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

It was the final match with the Tigers for their winger Pat Richards who joined English Super League club Wigan Warriors for the 2006 season.

Having won the NRL grand final, Wests had earned the right to play against 2005's Super League X Champions, the Bradford Bulls in the following February's World Club Challenge.