{"id":396028,"date":"2024-05-21T23:36:30","date_gmt":"2024-05-21T23:36:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=396028"},"modified":"2024-05-22T01:05:03","modified_gmt":"2024-05-22T01:05:03","slug":"wally-picks-maroons-17-with-confrontational-bolter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=396028","title":{"rendered":"Wally picks Maroons 17 with 'confrontational' bolter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Legendary Queensland<\/a> five-eighth Wally Lewis<\/a> has thrown his support behind Tom Dearden<\/a> to wear the famous No.6 jersey in a fortnight's time as he picked his Maroons 17 for game one.<\/p>\n

Origin icon Lewis picked \ufeffDearden over Ezra Mam to wear the jersey he made famous, while also picking a "confrontational" bolter to start in the pack and axing star winger Murray Taulagi.<\/p>\n

The Maroons are on the hunt for a replacement for superstar playmaker Cameron Munster<\/a>, who will miss the State of Origin<\/a> series with a groin injury.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Mundine's plea to Latrell amid growing crowd issue\ufeff<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Injured Origin XIII highlights grim crisis for Blues, Maroons<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\ufeffREAD MORE:<\/strong> Roosters seethe at 'false' claims from viral video<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Dearden, 23, appears locked in a battle with boom Brisbane young gun Mam to fill the void in Billy Slater's line-up.<\/p>\n

Mam, 21, scored a hat-trick in last year's NRL grand final to announce himself as a future long-term Origin star north of the Tweed.<\/p>\n

\"Coach<\/p>\n

But Slater and his selection team may lean towards the added experience of Dearden, who stepped in to play Munster's role in game three of the 2022 series and helped the Maroons to a series-deciding victory.<\/p>\n

"I quite like him," Lewis said of Dearden on Wide World of Sports' QLDER<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ufeff"He's got a bit of experience there – honestly, mate, it could go either way. \ufeffI guess the selectors will work with the coach on the preference there.<\/p>\n

"\ufeffHe's performed well – not that (Mam) couldn't – but I've seen (Dearden) perform extremely well in the toughest of circumstances, I quite enjoy watching him.<\/p>\n

Watch the 2024 NRL premiership live and free on Nine and<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

"He's got a bit of mongrel in him and can work extremely well in the toughest of situations."\ufeff<\/p>\n

Lewis named his Maroons\ufeff team for game one of the 2024 series.<\/p>\n

It includes Eels forward J'Maine Hopgood, who is a bolter for Slater's squad which will be named on Monday.<\/p>\n

"He's a performer, that guy," Lewis said of Hopgood.<\/p>\n

"He's physical, confrontational, \ufeffand can perform.<\/p>\n

\"J'maine<\/p>\n

"He got through a tireless amount of work in the games that I've seen him play."\ufeff<\/p>\n

Lewis has also selected Storm hooker Harry Grant to start and Ben Hunt on the bench, despite Slater typically opting to start Grant on the bench.<\/p>\n

The Maroons legend has axed Cowboys winger Murray Taulagi from the victorious 2023 side, while moving Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow to the wing in a swap with Selwyn Cobbo, who he's named at centre.\ufeff<\/p>\n

W\ufeffALLY'S MAROONS TEAM<\/h3>\n

1. Reece Walsh 2. Xavier Coates 3. Selwyn Cobbo 4. Val Holmes 5. Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow 6. Tom Dearden 7. Daly Cherry-Evans 8. Lindsay Collins 9. Harry Grant 10. Moeaki Fotuaika 11. David Fifita 12. Reuben Cotter 13. Patrick Carrigan. (Interchange) 14. Ben Hunt 15. Christian Welch 16. Jeremiah Nanai 17. J'Maine Hopgood\ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Legendary Queensland five-eighth Wally Lewis has thrown his support behind Tom Dearden to wear the famous No.6 jersey in a fortnight's time as he picked […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":396030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396028"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=396028"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":396033,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396028\/revisions\/396033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/396030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=396028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=396028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=396028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}