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| Bryce Cartwright has played the last five games at five-eighth. |
Cartwright had a mixed afternoon in Penrith’s 22-18 win over Parramatta at Pepper Stadium yesterday, making a number of errors in the first-half before scoring a try and putting in a valiant display to conclude the game.
Since debuting in 2014, Cartwright has played in the
back-row and in the lock position for the majority of his 46 NRL appearances.
But for the past five rounds, Cartwright has been handed the number-six by
Griffin in an effort to stimulate Penrith’s attack.
His suitability to the role has been questioned by many in the game – from fans to pundits – and the promising Panthers’ junior has looked far from fluent in the more hands-on role.
Speaking on Triple M’s The Verdict after yesterday’s game, former Penrith Grand-Final winner
Ryan Girdler voiced one of the stronger opinions about the situation.
“I just don’t think he’s a six,” Girdler said.
“I think he’s playing out of position, he gets
isolated defensively, again today he got carved up out wide.
“There were two or three times there that Gutherson
made him look silly.”
Girdler suggested Cartwright was the victim of his own
strengths’ as he tried to play his natural back-row running game from the unaccustomed
position of five-eighth.
“When you take away the role for Bryce to charge at
the line as a back-rower and offload through the line, or after he’s made
contact, then he feels like he’s a five-eight and he needs to pass before the
line,” Girdler said.
“I think you take a really good aspect of his game
away which is punching into the line with his size and then using his ability with
the ball after that.”
While Girdler was forthright in his opinion, co-host
Gorden Tallis believed it was the inexperience of the Panthers’ playmakers as a
whole, rather than Cartwright that need to improve their game.
“They’ve got to learn the time and space. The seven,
six, and one have got to learn what does my team need me to do now,” Tallis
said.
“They’re brilliant; they can put on tries – but Cartwright,
just because you’ve got the skill, doesn’t mean you have to use it every time.”
With Jamie Soward moving to the London Broncos to
prolong his own career and allow for the emergence of others, Penrith are stuck
in a tricky situation when it comes to key positions. While Peter Wallace looks
to have cemented his spot at hooker and Nathan Cleary has set-up shop at
halfback, the five-eighth and fullback positions remain a talking point.
Utility Tyrone Peachey has been forced to shift to
centres with long-term injuries to Peta Hiku and Dean Whare, while Matt Moylan’s
highly anticipated move to five-eighth came at the unlikely setting of
representative level, and freshly-signed Super League Man of Steel winner Zac
Hardaker spent the entire 80 minutes yesterday warming the bench.
Griffin is surely finding it difficult to position his
array of stars in their best and most natural positions.
But the former Broncos’ mentor spoke glowingly of
Cartwright’s performances in the halves, stipulating that the New South Wales
development player will be set to stay there for the near-future.
“I thought he did a good job tonight,” Griffin said.
“He scored a try, I thought he had a good balance of
running the ball when he needed to, I haven’t got a problem with him.
“The beauty about Bryce Cartwright is he can play a
lot of positions; you put him in the front row and he’d do a job for you.
“At the moment with the balance of our team, he’s doing
a good job for us.”
Griffin suggested that it is more about the players
around Bryce getting an education to how he operates in the position, while
also making reference to the side as a whole needing to roll their sleeves up.
With Cartwright’s stay looking more and more likely
that it will be for the rest of the year, unless Te Maire Martin can return to
the side from injury, Penrith’s edge players will need to develop a
cohesiveness with Cartwright in order to become an effective and consistent
threat.