Queensland dished out another Brisbane hiding to New South Wales today but the Blues still left the Gabba believing they were sneaking up on Australian cricket's best domestic team.

The eight-wicket win in less than three days flipped Queensland back to the top of the Pura Cup points table and left the Blues with another Gabba disaster to paste into their scrapbooks.

The Blues haven't taken a point from Brisbane in eight seasons and they were always in trouble today when their second innings total of 222 left the Bulls with just 133 runs for their second outright win of the season.

Jimmy Maher (61) and Martin Love (65no) made short work of the run chase on a drying wicket, steering the defending champions to 2-133 and leaving no doubt they were the favourites for a third successive title.

The Bulls were simply smarter on a greentop, with Michael Kasprowicz taking nine wickets, Ashley Noffke claiming four and Andrew Symonds scooping six with his dangerous medium pace.

But NSW captain Shane Lee wasn't wincing at the scorecard as he contemplated three days of dropped catches and near misses for the Blues.

"New South Wales have been up here plenty of times and been absolutely thumped on a wicket like that," Lee said.

"If we had managed to get 200 or 250 ahead, it would have been a totally different game with Queensland chasing on a wicket still doing a bit.

"But losing wickets in clumps really cost us in the end and the catches that went down made the difference."

Lee was the main catching culprit, spilling Wade Seccombe yesterday just 14 runs into a 109-run partnership with captain Stuart Law which gave Queensland a match-winning plank.

Even Law wasn't glowing about Queensland's performance, admitting NSW quick Stuart Clark (4-61 and 2-34) was the pick of the bowlers from both teams.

Law said the Blues "outbowled" his team and declared some of his batsmen were lucky to get away with shots that would normally cause their downfalls.

But the Blues failed to take their chances, especially late yeasterday when they reached a healthy 2-142 before the wheels fell off.

Brisbane is becoming a barren battleground for the Blues, who are joining Victoria as non-winners at the ground, and Law said the conditions might worry the visitors.

"They don't like to walk out there and see grass on that wicket," Law said.

"That's the way it used to be and you see the other guys walking up and looking at it and they just don't want to get out there and play on it.

"(The wicket) does a bit more than anywhere else in the country and it's an advantage we've got but we're going to have to play better cricket if we want to beat teams.

"New South Wales had their opportunities here but we probably outbatted them in the end."

The teams return to the Gabba on Friday afternoon for an ING Cup one-day match.

© 2001 AAP