NSW could and should have picked a utility

The NSW team for Game 2 of State of Origin has been announced and despite all the chatter and reckless speculation about the halves (a topic for another day) in the end only two changes were made to the team who dropped their lollies in Game 1.

In the backline Brett Morris replaces the ineffectual Daniel Tupou – a no brainer.

Tupou has been poor in all four of his Origin games to date and until NSW select a half who is willing and able to chip kick effectively to him there is little reason to pick him.

Beyond his paucity of contribution in attack Tupou is a mediocre defender and also is by no stretch of the imagination a metre-eater placing 44th among wingers for average metres per game this season.

Morris adds truly elite speed and finishing to the NSW line up to go with solid defence, and should be a welcome addition.

In the forwards, leaving aside very real questions about whether his truck-it-up mentality stifles the NSW attack at times, it was always clear that Paul Gallen would be an automatic inclusion if fit.

That it came at the expense of Andrew Fifita was more surprising. Fifita was sub-par in Origin 1, and David Klemmer brought all of the aggression and hard running that NSW selectors would have been hoping for from the Shark.

However a case could equally be made for Gallen replacing either Boyd Cordner or Josh Jackson, neither of whom made any real impact. To be fair to Cordner and Jackson though, neither was put in the best position to succeed. Indeed the mismanagement of the forwards, including the bench forwards, by NSW was a big part of why they lost Game 1 and threatens to derail Game 2 as well.

Cordner’s strongest attribute is that he runs terrific lines on the edge. Outside in, inside out and often as not, straight through a hole. So it made zero sense to bring him on as the first interchange of the game for Jackson and put him in the middle-of-the-field grind. It made about as much sense as putting Jackson, who has played the vast majority of his games as an edge backrower, in the middle unit to start the game.

While they are often collectively referred to as the backrow, the role of the right and left-edge forward, where Jackson and Cordner respectively tend to ply their trade, is quite distinct to that of the lock, who is very much part of the middle unit. Some skills and attributes overlap and the ability to pass well and use footwork to beat a defender are universal. But whereas the best edge backrowers use angled running and ball play in the more open spaces on the edge of the ruck, lock forwards have more in common with props in that their goal is mostly to use straight-ahead power to bend the line and ideally follow that with a quick play the ball.

Both Cordner and Jackson are accomplished players who have the ability to play in a number of positions, including lock, but surely when the stakes are as high as they are in Origin it is more prudent to put players in the position where they are most comfortable?

The reality is that there are 160 minutes available for edge backrowers and if Ryan Hoffman is going to play 80 of those minutes and Beau Scott another 60 it doesn’t leave a lot of time for players like Jackson and Cordner to shine. So why pick both of them?

Another player who was criminally misused in Origin 1 was Trent Merrin, who was the last player used in the game coming on at the 60-minute mark. Again this runs counter to Merrin’s strongest attribute – his phenomenal work rate and athleticism for his size and position.

Merrin beats you by being faster and lighter on his feet for longer than the players opposing him in the middle of the field. So why would you wait until 20 minutes remaining in the game to bring him on? Merrin’s speed and dynamic running might make him look like an ideal impact player but in reality you get more benefit out of him the longer he is on the field (which is exactly why the Panthers are prepared to pay him big money as the spectre of reduced interchange looms over the league).

But again we need to do some arithmetic for Game 2, because Gallen’s return will squeeze the minute availability in the middle of the field as well. Assuming we consider lock as part of the middle unit, with the two front spots, we have 240 minutes available to distribute and the maths just doesn’t add up.

Gallen we know is a glutton for punishment so we can reasonably expect him to play 60 minutes. Meanwhile, the starting props James Tamou and Aaron Woods were both good for 50 minutes in Game 1, while Klemmer played 30 (well 29 but who’s counting?). All can be reasonably expected to replicate those minutes in Game 2.

Calling on skills not exercised since high school then that gets us to approximately 190 of those 240 minutes, and that’s before we account for Merrin, who we can agree would be better served with significantly more minutes than the 20 he was allotted in Game 1, and the likelihood that one of Cordner or Jackson will need to spend some time in the middle unit to get any game time.

This adds up to well over the 240 minutes available in the middle unit.

All of which provides the context for the other simmering debate in rugby league circles, the question of whether NSW should have dropped a forward and added a utility to the bench.

The Bulldogs’ Josh Reynolds and Canberra’s Blake Austin are the obvious candidates, along with Luke Lewis who probably offers less genuine utility than the other two but is still a fine player.

Either Reynolds or Austin would be ideal candidates to fill a super-sub role for NSW, whether as a half, dummy half or even a running lock forward role – such as the role Daly Cherry-Evans has played in recent years for Queensland in an attempt to manufacture more points.

Both Reynolds and Austin are creative players who thrive on playing a supporting role and contribute for their teams without needing much ball. In a typical game both players touch the ball anywhere between 20 to 35 times, significantly fewer than more ball-dominant halves such as Mitchell Pearce or Cooper Cronk, who might touch the ball 50 to 60 times a game, or Johnathan Thurston who is known to have over 70 touches in a game.

Moreover when they do have the ball Reynolds and Austin share an inclination to run it, which is an essential quality for an impact player. Among halves only Anthony Milford has more running metres than Austin, and while Reynolds’ total running metres are lower due to playing fewer games, his average running metres place him seventh among regular and semi-regular halves.

Austin perhaps has the better case overall when it comes to running the ball given his 12 line breaks, which place him equal fourth overall, and his club-leading nine tries.

However the case for either player goes beyond the stats on the page as both have well-earned reputations as a catalyst for their respective clubs. Both bring boundless energy, and while Reynolds has a somewhat tempestuous relationship with the rules both are apparently adored by their teammates. One only need look at the most recent weekend’s games to see the impact that both players had for their respective sides.

In recent years Origin has become a largely defensive affair, with NSW having only scored 20 points on four occasions during the era of Queensland dominance dating back to 2006. That is four scores of 20 or more in the last 28 games, with the overall tally reading Queensland eight series wins, NSW one.

Perhaps it is time to start looking for a way to find more points and win by outscoring Queensland rather than out-defending them?

Dropping a forward, who as we have seen will probably get under-utilised anyway, in favour of a points-creating utility would have been a good way to start.