Round 18 Talking Points: Laughable situation with Test schedule unresolved as Origin debate flares up yet again

It’s a sad indictment on our game that here we are in July and the debate about when Origin should be played has flared up again yet we still don’t know when the Tests are on at the end of the year.

We’ve been having the annual debate for 30-plus years about whether the State of Origin series should be held during the season or at the end of the year.

Now there’s been a suggestion of a possible three-week window mid-year where you suspend club footy but I don’t think that’s the answer.

The ARL Commission has been talking for months about possibly starting the season off next year with a couple of games in Las Vegas but I think more energy and attention should be focused closer to home. 

It’s a poor look for our game that we don’t have a proper international calendar for the next few years plus the World Cup venue in 2025 is unknown because France backed out. 

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Clubs need to start planning their off-season programs for their players. Some will need to have surgery or you need to factor in how much rest they’ll get before they can start training again but it’s impossible to know because we don’t know when the Australian team, as well as other national sides like Samoa, New Zealand and Fiji, are going to be playing.

If I had a player on a contract and my club was paying 95% of his salary for the year, I’d want to know when he’d be on Test duty because that’s going to have an impact on his off-season and the following season.

Origin is the jewel in the crown for our game and we all understand the economics of it bringing in many millions of dollars to the NRL’s coffers, particularly through broadcast rights, sponsorship, ticket sales and merchandise.

We’re only a few years away from the next deal being done and the game’s administrators need to sit down with the clubs, the players’ association and the broadcasters and come to find a solution on where Origin sits on the calendar. 

No other sport in the world would think it’s a good idea to stop their competition midway through the year and let their best players bash each other in rep games three times before going back to their club duties.

There’d be no administrator anywhere on the globe who’d agree to upsetting their applecart like that so why do we do it? It makes no sense logically and rationally so why keep doing it just because that’s the way it’s always been done?

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I applaud Ivan Cleary’s approach at Penrith in resting his rep players en masse because of his concerns about their workload when they back up after Origin.

It worked for them when they beat Newcastle last week with their back-up players filling in and then they came back to win from 14-0 down in Melbourne on Friday night with those rep players looking a lot fresher than what they would have been if they’d backed up the previous round. 

Clubs have a top 30 so you should have enough depth to cover your rep guys but not every team has a roster like Penrith’s so it’s a risk whenever you stand guys down.

In the short term there should be an automatic stand-down for Origin players the weekend after playing on the Wednesday night.

With the last match of this year’s series being a dead rubber it wouldn’t surprise me if some clubs are influencing their star players who may have some minor injuries to make themselves unavailable for Origin to concentrate on the back end of the year.

Broadcasters pay huge amounts to have the rights for the content the game provides so you expect them to have a monumental say in where Origin works best.

We’re always going backwards after the deals are agreed and then plenty of people have a whinge three years later. We’ve got to get the structure in place ahead of time.

Whether it’s 18 teams for the NRL down the track, we need to have that plan locked in.

The game needs to find the right solution for Origin scheduling otherwise we’ll be having this same debate next year and the one after that.

(Photo by Ian Hitchcock/Getty Images)

AJ looks a-OK for Maroons recall

I think Billy Slater will go with AJ Brimson as his new fullback now that Reece Walsh has been suspended for his rant against the referee last week.

He’s also on the lookout for a new prop with Tom Flegler out with his foot injury so I think the time is right for Corey Horsburgh to get a run in Origin III to see how he’d go in that arena.

For the Blues, I don’t think they’ll change things up too much. 

Tom Trbojevic being out at centre and no Latrell Mitchell and now no Campbell Graham means Stephen Crichton and Kotoni Staggs are probably their best bets. 

Staggs has been back to his best for Brisbane this season and he’s a specialist centre.

Jake Trbojevic played well in his comeback for Manly on Sunday so I’d be finding a spot for him in the pack somewhere.

Cameron Murray and Liam Martin should be in the starting side too. It’s like when you’re playing cards, you should get your trumps out as quick as possible so I wouldn’t have them on the bench again.

Cowboys guns a blazing after being shot to pieces

I mentioned a few weeks back after the Cowboys being on the receiving end of a 66-18 hammering on the road to the Wests Tigers that when you’re a coach in those games, you don’t really know how they happen whichever side of the equation you’re on.

What has been pleasing for North Queensland since that match in Round 12 is how they’ve responded – they were much better the next week when the lost by eight at Parra but then they’ve beaten Melbourne 45-20, got the better of the Panthers in extra time when they both had a few Origin players out, thumped the Rabbitohs 31-6 and now got their revenge on the Tigers.

The 74-0 scoreline was incredible and it’s the flip side of the Origin period.

Sometimes it can help a team with a few Origin reps because not only do the players come back to their club with more confidence and spring in their step like we’ve seen with Jeremiah Nanai, Murray Taulagi and Reece Robson, but their success can also have a positive impact on the rest of the team.

(Photo by Ian Hitchcock/Getty Images)

Even though it’s intense in Origin, it’s a fun time for players to be part of a camp among an elite environment and as long as they don’t come back injured or too fatigued, there can be benefits from rep duty mid-season, particularly for a team that had been struggling like the Cowboys.

They look like a team in good spirits with plenty of harmony. The old “losers have meetings and winners have parties” saying is true.

The Cowboys are back in contention now just outside of the eight but they’ve got a fair bit of work to do still even though they’ve got a couple of byes up their sleeve.

It’s going to be really hard to be sure of who’s going to make the final eight up until the final month with the uneven nature of the draw with some clubs having all their weeks off and others still getting two more byes.

Teams dropping away into the abyss 

Like the bottom part of a rocket that drops away after lift-off, some teams at this time of year fall away dramatically and the Wests Tigers, St George Illawarra and Canterbury fall into that category.

They were all handed hidings this week and there’s a bit of separation between the top teams, the ones in contention for the finals and the ones who will just be playing for pride in the last two months of the regular season.

It’s the worst situation to be in as a coach when you know your team cannot make the playoffs and you’ve got to keep the motivation and interest up in the side.

You’ve still got to apply the necessary mental and physical preparation each week but it’s a challenge when the players know there’s not much to play for apart from avoiding the wooden spoon..