Queensland great Cameron Smith believes Queensland must find a specialist centre if they’re any hope of fighting back in the State of Origin series.
Tom Trbojevic dominated in the centres for New South Wales on Wednesday night, scoring a hat-trick to lead the Blues to a 50-6 win, and Smith says Paul Green’s focus must be on how to stop the Manly star.
“For starters, I think we need to look at that centre position and how we stop Tommy Turbo,” Smith said on SEN 1170 Breakfast.
“He almost had free reign last night where he just carved up our edge defence.
“I know Kurt Capewell’s played centres and he’s done a great job there in the past – he’s in our team, there’s no doubt about that – but you might have to move him closer to the middle to play back row or the ruck.
“Hopefully we can find someone (to play centre).”
After going down by their biggest loss in Origin history, Smith says Queensland need to “hit the reset button” before Game 2.
“There’s going to reviews done by the coach, selectors and the team as well,” Smith added.
“For the Queensland mindset now it’s almost like you need to review that straight away and pretty much hit the reset button.
“There’s no positive about thinking about this or dwelling on it too much going into Game 2.
“They just need to hit the reset button and go into Game 2 with a fresh mindset and a better attitude than what they had last night.”
Origin II is set for Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on Sunday, June 27.