NSW Blues coach Brad Fittler has warned ARL Commission chairman Peter V’landys and other rugby league powerbrokers to keep their hands off the iconic State of Origin concept.
The 2020 series between the Blues and Queensland Maroons will be played in November for the first time due to the COVID-19 mid-season break.
V’landys on Monday night told Channel 9’s 100% Footy playing Origin in November could become a ‘permanent change’ if this year’s edition ‘rates the roof off’.
But Fittler, who has led the Blues to series wins in his first two seasons in charge, urged V’landys and co to ‘leave the good toy alone’ and return the interstate series to its traditional mid-season slot in 2021.
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“There’s so many more complications playing it after the grand-final,” a fired-up Fitler told Wide World of Sports Radio.
“… All of a sudden, you’re playing three games, there’s a responsibility towards players and their rest, there’s clubs that need them back training when they can after their six or eight-week’s rest.
“So where players fall in amongst that and how big are your squads? There’s a whole lot of questions to answer. If you run out of players where do you find a player in Bali?
“They are all realistic questions to ask if you’re going to start putting it in at the end of the season.
“The fact is in the middle of the season it’s the middle of winter, people are watching TV, ratings and advertising dollars are bigger in the middle of winter, so I find it very hard to believe that they’re going to change it.”
Fittler added: “Also there’s the part of our game, the international football, if you’re playing three Origin games, so you’re not going to be able to play an international game until at least November, and all of a sudden you’re really cutting into their downtime.”
“If it ain’t broke, don’t bother trying to fix it.
“And I think State of Origin at the moment a lot of people are trying to fix something that’s not fixable.
“… When you’ve got that good toy, you just don’t want anyone messing with your good toy.
“Leave the good toy alone, go and play with something else and change something else.”
