NSW Origin problem-solvers come to the fore amid NRL focus on HIA and sin-bins

The utility bench player is a feature of modern rugby league, but NSW coach Brad Fittler thinks their role is changing and he’s got some of the best banging down his selection door.

When is it too early to begin picking your NSW State of Origin team?

The answer: We’re already late.

Four days behind, to be precise.

Last Wednesday, Blues coach Brad Fittler gathered his coaching staff together.

Fittler and his NSW assistants including Danny Buderus and Paul McGregor pulled out their notebooks and began pouring over every player born south of the Tweed.

Even players from the NSW north coast hamlet of Kempsey, where Greg Inglis says he’s from, were included.

The meeting was held with just under nine weeks until the Blues commence their defence of the prized-Origin shield against Billy Slater‘s Queensland on June 8.

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Nicho Hynes’s form and versatility makes him a great fit for the Blues. Picture: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images

The discussion between the Blues brains-trust included picking Manly’s Tom Trbojevic in a blue jumper, even if he’s only had one run back from minor knee surgery.

It’s also unanimous that loyalty to the players who got the job done 2-1 over the Maroons last year have a headstart on anyone else.

Then the Blues chat turned to a discussion that has catapulted Cronulla’s Nicho Hynes, Manly’s Dylan Walker and Melbourne’s Ryan Papenhuyzen into genuine consideration for a NSW jersey this year.

The NRL’s current issue rising from the implementation this year of an independent doctor charged with spotting alleged head knocks from a bunker is increasingly leaving coaches without enough Band-Aid players who can fix the bleeding.

On top of the rate of dismissal of players for a HIA, the dramatic 230 per cent increase of sin bins so far this season compared to this time last year, has left Fittler adamant that he will need to pick a utility player, capable of playing almost any position in the backline, as well as, in the middle of the field, as a small-forward or running lock.

In the past two series, he‘s used the likes of Jack Wighton, Isaah Yeo and Api Koroisau to get the Blues out of a positional jam.

However, this year, the Blues utility will need even more strings to his bow.

Fittler and his staff have watched the first five rounds and witnessed the manic – and largely fruitless – positional changes of team‘s when a coach loses of all players, his winger.

Most regularly, the centre is moved to the wing, the backrower to the centre, a middle man to the edge and then a bench forward into the action.

The end product is clunky and out of sorts. And in Origin, that‘s failure.

Fittler explained why Hynes, Walker and Papenhuyzen can lay a claim over the next few weeks.

Dylan Walker has reinvented himself from an outside back to a middle forward. Picture: Glenn Hunt/Getty Images

“One thing that will be crucial this year, is our bench,” Fittler told The Locker Room.

“I think the big thing for Nicho is, he’s proven that he can play in so many positions.

“We’ve seen already the amount of wingers that have had a HIA, it causes an automatic reshuffle of so many bodies.

“And with the amount of sin bins there have been, we’re really going to have to think carefully about the bench with players that can play in multiple positions.

“If you remember, Papenhuyzen and all those guys from Melbourne like (Cooper) Cronk, (Cameron) Munster, all played in the middle of the field and Hynes did as well, at times during their careers at the Storm.

Victor Radley can cover several forward positions but can he cover in the backs? Picture: Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images

“Another one who can play numerous positions that is going great, is Dylan Walker.

“Victor Radley can play hooker, back-row and lock-forward as well.

“That role will absolutely be crucial.”

Fittler’s senior advisor Greg Alexander summed-up the Blues focus on finding their Mr Fix-It over the next nine weeks.

“I think this year more than ever it will be a definite area that we will have to give more a lot of thought too,” Alexander said.

“With the way the game is being officiated and how quickly you can be left short a player these days, versatility will be key.”

Originally published as NSW Origin problem-solvers come to the fore amid NRL focus on HIA and sin-bins