Crash Craddock: Why Billy Slater was right to take risks with Queensland’s game one State of Origin squad

It smacked of a decision that went against everything the Maroons stand for - dumping two proven performers - but Billy Slater’s risk-taking will pay off, and Robert Craddock explains why.

Billy Slater.

Billy Slater was once a brave player. Now he is a brave coach.

Reporter Sean Lawson got it right on Monday when he said this is Slater’s “chip and chase’’ State of Origin team.

Remember that night back in 2004 when Slater reached low to swoop on a Darren Lockyer grubber, then swerved and curved and regained his own chip kick to score one of the great Origin tries.

In the eyes of the rest of the world Slater’s actions were bold in the extreme. An audacious gamble. A dice roll.

Slater didn’t see it his way. He has practised those sorts of moves countless times. To him it was like touch typing.

He felt the percentages were with him. That is the way it turned out. Now he has put a similar lens on his first State of Origin team.

Dropping Dane Gagai and Kalyn Ponga are huge, daring moves.

Kalyn Ponga and Dane Gagai have been left out of Queensland’s game one squad.

Win or lose, the one consoling factor for Slater is that he will not die wondering. He got the team he wanted. There can be no regrets.

The magnitude of how big the Ponga-Gagai moves are was reinforced to me during an hour spent at the Origin media afternoon at Suncorp on Monday where the shockwaves were still lapping upon the shore.

You would not say there was anger, or abject bewilderment in the air. But there was surprise and that is very rare for Queensland’s normally predictable first side of the winter after they have won the previous match and series the year before.

Billy Slater was a brave player for Queensland.

And is proving similar in his role as Maroons coach.

Journalists were saying things to each other things like “gotta say I thought Gagai would get another go’’ or “generally it is the Queensland way to give guys one more chance.’’

That’s true and I too was hoping Gagai, that hardwired, gnarled, gritty competitor who played 22 Origins in a row, would get another chance despite one of the worst matches of his career for the Knights on Saturday afternoon.

But here’s the thing.

The loyalty card was often used in an era of limited options. If you stuck with a player basically because there was no-one else it was always better to say “we value loyalty’’ rather than “well, we really didn’t have much choice.’’

This year they do have a choice.

Gagai’s replacement, Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow, delivers flair with a low error rate.

Reece Walsh delivers magical attacking raids which must surely remind Slater of himself – but he can make errors.

The forensic way Walsh studies games he is not involved in always looking for the edge is very Slateresque as well.

But the trimmings don’t really matter. Win in Adelaide and everything is justified.

Lose and the questions will come from everywhere.

Slater knows all of this which is why his moves are so daring.