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There is no doubting Benji Marshall’s contributions to the Wests Tigers franchise since debuting as a fresh-faced 18-year-old way back in 2004.
With the help of silky playmaker, Scott Prince, the Tigers ushered in a new era of attacking football that took the National Rugby League by storm. The joint venture club became an overnight sensation and plenty of that had to do with Marshall and Prince.
The combination was deadly.
Having Prince inside him helped Marshall concentrate purely on his own game.
Leading the team was Prince’s responsibility and Benji was free to do as he pleased.
The 2005 premiership victory came and went and so did Prince as the talented pivot headed north to become the Gold Coast Titans’ inaugural skipper.
No Prince? No worries. Surely Benji could do the job.
Then reality set in.
For whatever reason former coach Tim Sheens never found a long-term replacement for Prince. The years rolled on and Marshall was left to run the show on his own.
Since Prince left the Tigers at the end of 2006, Marshall has been partnered with 14 different men in the halves.
The mighty task of trying to create a new combination with a different playmaker almost on a weekly basis for the past seven years surely takes it toll on your personal performance.
Sure Marshall isn’t the player he once was.
Is he too heavy? Who knows.
Are media commitments hampering his career? Maybe.
But the fact that Marshall has been left to steer the ship for so long when he clearly isn’t that type of player is staggering.
It seems Wests still haven’t copped the tip in 2013 with Jacob Miller, Curtis Sironen and Braith Anasta all spending time with Marshall in the halves.
Wests play the North Queensland Cowboys on Friday night at Leichhardt Oval with Marshall returning to the starting line-up at five-eighth with Sironen at seven.
Yet to re-sign with the club, Marshall is desperate to deliver.
“I don’t want to comment on what happened last week,” Marshall told a media scrum at Tigers training in Kiama.
“I am back in the team this week and starting and we have to win. Full stop.
“I know what my role is and I will be trying to do what I did when I came on last week. The best way is to go back and look at what I was doing well when I was going well. That is my running game. All the rest comes off that.”
The time has come for the Tigers to either recruit a legitimate NRL halfback or invest heavily in youngsters like Luke Brooks and Mitchell Moses and give Marshall a legitimate chance of sparking Wests into action.
The seven year experiment hasn’t worked.
Benji Marshall is not the leader Scott Prince was.
There is only one thing he needs to worry about on Friday night and that’s himself.
Benji’s partners post-Prince: 2007
Robbie Farah
John Morris
Paul Whatuira
2008
John Morris
Matthew Head
Robbie Farah
2009
John Morris
Tim Moltzen
Robert Lui
2010
Robert Lui
Tim Moltzen
Blake Lazarus
Robbie Farah
Blake Ayshford
Chris Lawrence
2011
Robert Lui
Tim Moltzen
Jacob Miller
2012
Tim Moltzen
Jacob Miller
Tom Humble
Chris Lawrence
Blake Ayshford
Curtis Sironen
Robbie Farah
Liam Fulton
2013
Jacob Miller
Braith Anasta
Curtis Sironen
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