2019 State of Origin

No reasonable person could look at the current rules and say yeah I’m cool with forcing someone to play against a team they actually support, and for a team they feel compelled to support.

Keary is a victim of these ludicrous rules. But if playing Origin at all is more important to him than playing Origin for Qld then yeah we don’t want him either. It’s a shame he’s been put in that position.

 

Pongs is the best fullback in the game. He just hasn’t had more than 10 minutes of footy there in 6 months.

 

I’d be picking either Friend or Hunt at hooker for Qld. I’ve never liked McCullough.

 

Ponga isn't a stretch. He's better than Tedesco. I don't care how few games he's played there. He's the more complete fullback. He has no weakness in any part of his game.

He demonstrated that last year in a pus team.

 

And that’s coming from someone who actually thinks Tedesco’s passing game is hugely underrated. I say passing game and not ball playing because to me, the traditional sense, ball playing primarily concerns creating gaps between defenders. I don’t see him do a lot of that. He can but it’s pretty rare, touch for touch. But he has an under-appreciated cut-out and he’s quite good at exploiting numbers. I think he could do it a bit more as he’s still a little too eager on being tackled for my liking.

Ponga is different. He has finesse. He has true ball playing ability that allows him to put players through even when they’re numbered up with double-pumps, holding up the defensive line, feigning long to play short, drawing in A defenders to create space and so on. And he does it pretty consistently. It’s obviously part of why he’s been shifted. In fact I think he’s better at it than even Lockyer or Hayne were.

Matter of time/footy before it’s taken as read imo.

 

This playing backrowers up front shit needs to stop. We're not going into Origin with fucking Jai Arrow at prop. Arrow is a superb player, in fact I think he should be a walk up start at lock, but enough with the mobility garbage. It is a secondary concern to metres, not a subset of it.

I honestly don't even care that much who starts and who comes from the bench but our 4 best props are Scott, McGuire, Napa and Papalii. Arrow at lock. Based on metres and a ton of offloads, he has to start. Not Gillett, not McGuire, not Papalii.

Fuck off with Glasby and Wallace. They're not up to it. Hess can fuck off too until he learns how to tackle.

1.Ponga
2.Oates
3.Inglis (c)
4.Chambers
5.Gagai
6.Munster
7.DCE
8.Scott
9.Friend
10.McGuire
11.
12.
13.Arrow

14.Morgan
15.Papalii
16.Napa
17.

That's what I'm looking at currently...

We have a team capable of beating NSW this year. No doubt in my mind. We showed that in Game 2 and 3. We absolutely should've beaten them in Sydney last year.

 

Yeah I thought, and said at the time, Tedesco was the best player in Origin last year.

And yes I’ll grant you that he’s the better fullback defensively. But everything he has over Ponga is imo, relatively marginal. I don’t think he’s quantitatively better than Ponga at any of them

I’d actually say Tedesco’s running game is in fact better than Ponga’s, but again it’s extremely close.

The one aspect where I do believe there is a huge difference, is in their ball playing ability. Again, I don’t see Tedesco as a genuine ball player really. Hence them moving Latrell and not him. And I think Ponga’s got a much better kicking game.

In terms of stats, there are different ways you can read them. I mean we have to acknowledge that we’re talking about fullbacks here and just by virtue of the strength of their teams, 1st vs 11th, there’s a disparity in opportunity. Yeah he hasn’t put together a season denoting stats like that; he’s also never played behind such a strong side.

I still think it’s amazing that Ponga was leading the comp for a fair bit in try assists and line break assists, playing fullback and in a bottom 8 side.

 

When was that?