@Toowoomba_Tiger said in [NSW Origin II Team](/post/1025891) said:
I was stunned like the rest of us with Mitchell's exclusion, but I seen a story on NRL.com yesterday.
It describes passages of play with footage and I must admit it totally justifies Freddy's decision imo.
Any NSW fan should be disgusted with the lack of effort show by Mitchell and how much it impacted the game.
Freddy trying to set new standards around the Blues simply can't carry the bloke, even if he can produce moments of brilliance.
Dead set Case Closed for me after watching it - go have a look at the link below
https://www.nrl.com/news/2019/06/20/the-seven-moments-that-cost-latrell-mitchell-his-nsw-jersey/
I think you've been hoodwinked TBH. I read the article and watched the footage in full.
It reeks of panicked support of an unpopular decision. About half of the incidents were spurious at best. E.g. "if Latrell doesn't go for the intercept QLD don't make the break". That's a one-time decision, it's not as if Latrell is notorious for rushing out for intercepts.
I am 99% sure of three things:
(1) If I was to look at any Latrell Mitchell match at all, I could pick out 7 instances where he could have tried harder;
(2) If I was to apply the same review to Greg Inglis, I'd also find tonnes of instances where GI could have "pushed up" more aggressively;
(3) I could pick any single game and find instances of laziness for any player in the Origin side. Especially at Origin level, given the constant speed of the matches and the weight of the collisions.
Or to put it another way - Josh Morris apparently did nothing wrong, but he got hooked as well. Where is the review of the Josh Morris laziness incidents? And Wighton threw the match-turning pass and he got promoted - don't need a highlights reel to remember that part. But ho, Wighton gets promoted.
We only have to cast our minds back 1 year, Latrell has had some indifferent Origin matches before.
I made the Inglis comparison #2 to highlight that they have similar styles of involvement - neither GI nor Latrell are 100% push-up, 100% on-ball players like, say, a Slater or a Cronk. They are going to get a bit lazy at times, they are going to fail to chase some kicks and sometimes go for the hero play instead of the smart play.
They are also the two blokes that when you give them the ball with nothing on, they are as likely as any other footballer to create something, just through pure physical ability.
But bottom line is that Latrell, Tedesco and Cook are the Top 3, dare I say ONLY 3, threats in the NSW side. How QLD must be so happy to be facing up Morgan/Chambers vs Turbo/Wighton, rather than Turbo/Mitchell.
And when your opposition is pleased with your selections, you've either got an ambush set up or you've made a critical mistake. You all reckon Jack Wighton is going to ambush QLD in Game II? Jack Wighton who, apart from being a mug at any given time, hasn't played a match at centre since Rd 23 2014?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
What he said. 100% agree
