State of Origin 2024: Queensland hits back at claims Latrell Mitchell has infiltrated Camp Maroon

NSW legend Andrew Johns believes Latrell Mitchell’s return to State of Origin has infiltrated Camp Maroon. One Queensland veteran has rubbished the claims.

Ben Hunt.

Maroons hooker Ben Hunt has hit back at NSW legend Andrew Johns and rubbished suggestions Blues bogeyman Latrell Mitchell is in Queensland’s heads ahead of Origin II on Wednesday night.

NSW’s greatest halfback Johns lobbed a grenade into Camp Maroon with the NRL Immortal claiming Mitchell has a psychological hold over the Queensland team he carved up in the 2021 series.

Hunt says the Maroons would be foolish not to game plan for a NSW superstar, but Queensland’s match-winning rake dismissed claims Billy Slater’s troops are mentally scarred by Mitchell.

“He hasn’t got into our heads at all,” said Hunt, one of seven survivors of the Maroons’ horror 2021 campaign.

“We have done preparation on him, like you would on any good player.

“There’s a lot of guys in that team who are going to hurt us as well, so we can’t just go into a State of Origin match completely worried about one player.”

After a two-year hiatus due to injury, Mitchell is back in sky blue and NSW are banking on the hulking 105kg centre to save the series at the MCG in the wake of Queensland’s thumping 38-10 win in Game One in Sydney.

Ben Hunt.

Mitchell will run onto the MCG with the hot hand in Origin.

In his most recent series in 2021, he posted four tries and 24 points from three games, plus 31 runs, 419 metres, three line breaks and 17 tackle busts to spearhead a ruthless 2-1 series mauling of the Maroons.

“He is a huge threat,” Hunt said.

“We know what Latrell is capable of and what he has done in the Origin arena.

“We will have our hands pretty full trying to hang onto him, so we need to be very disciplined in the way we defend him.

“We have to defend him as a team because if we give him any bit of room he is going to hurt us.

“We need to defend really well.”

Queensland centre Valentine Holmes will mark up against Mitchell and has vowed to “get in his face”, an assessment that prompted Johns to say: “Good luck tackling Latrell”.

“We have faith in Val to do his job,” Hunt said.

“He has been playing Origin for a long time now and he will get out there and do his job.”

23-game NSW legend Johns believes Mitchell will be virtually unstoppable in the return bout as Queensland look to bury the Blues in straight sets.

“You can get him one on one, it doesn’t matter,” said Channel 9 expert Johns of Mitchell.

“He burns them, you get two defenders on him, he burns them.

“Just give him the ball.

“Latrell is a big-game player. He has copped so much this year and the last couple of years.

“All eyes are on Latrell. The bigger the stage, the more the pressure, the more eyes on him, the better he goes.

“This is a way for Latrell to elevate himself back to those superstar qualities.”

Maroons pivot Tom Dearden believes Queensland have formulated a game plan to muzzle Mitchell.

“He is a massive threat,” he said.

“That’s the player Latrell is, but we have to focus on getting our game right and control possession.

“If we do that, it will nullify his impact on the game.”

The Maroons wrapped up preparations with a trouble-free session at Sanctuary Cove on Monday morning before heading to Melbourne in their quest for a hat-trick of Origin titles.