{"id":88906,"date":"2021-06-22T00:21:05","date_gmt":"2021-06-22T00:21:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=88906"},"modified":"2021-06-22T00:57:46","modified_gmt":"2021-06-22T00:57:46","slug":"nsw-legend-stunned-by-maroons-stars-axing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=88906","title":{"rendered":"NSW legend stunned by Maroons star's axing"},"content":{"rendered":"

NSW great Peter Sterling says he was stunned by Queensland's decision to drop flying winger Xavier Coates for State of Origin<\/a> II.<\/p>\n

Coates' axing was somewhat overshadowed by the Maroons' bombshell selection<\/a> of 18-year-old fullback Reece Walsh, even though it was a direct consequence. Walsh replaced Valentine Holmes at No.1, with Holmes then moved into Coates' wing position.<\/p>\n

"To me, that's huge. If he's not in the best two wingers in Queensland, then I'm a very, very poor judge," Sterling said on Wide World of Sports' Sterlo's Wrap<\/em>.<\/p>\n

"Obviously his club side [Brisbane] is struggling and maybe there was some defensive issues in game one but to be honest, I thought he'd be one of their first players chosen."<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Coates was terrorised by Latrell Mitchell and Brian To'o while defending on the right wing, with the NSW centre\/wing pair scoring a combined four tries. However, he was a breakout star of Queensland's shock series win last year, scoring in his first two matches.<\/p>\n

Debutant winger Kyle Feldt also had a tough outing for Queensland in Origin I, yet kept his spot for Sunday's must-win game two in Brisbane. Cronulla winger Ronaldo Mulitalo was named 19th man, in a further snub to Coates.<\/p>\n

"Kyle Feldt probably was a little bit fortunate there," Sterling said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

All eyes will be on Walsh when Origin II kicks off. The Warriors fullback has played just seven NRL games, making him the second-least experienced player in Queensland Origin history.<\/p>\n

"Big ask for a young man but he's obviously revelled in the pressure of NRL football," Sterling said.<\/p>\n

"Now he's got to take that into a bigger stage. It will be a crowd that will make it much easier for him but you've still got to get the job done."<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NSW great Peter Sterling says he was stunned by Queensland's decision to drop flying winger Xavier Coates for State of Origin II. Coates' axing was […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"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\/88906"}],"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=88906"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88906\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88908,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88906\/revisions\/88908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=88906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=88906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=88906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}