‘Don’t overthink it’: Joey’s Turbo plea as switch beckons

“Turbo and myself have had conversations around what we can do to help him, and I’ll keep those conversations private,” Seibold told media on Thursday.

“But obviously how (Tolutau Koula) goes at fullback over coming weeks, (we’ll) see how Turbo is feeling about his body and make a decision from there.”

Since the start of the 2019 season, Trbojevic has made just 65 appearances for Manly from a possible 132 – an appearance rate of only 49.2 per cent. That will only drop further given he isn’t expected to return from this latest hamstring injury for some time yet.

Speaking on Wide World of Sports’ Freddy and the Eighth, Immortal Andrew Johns was against the idea, urging Seibold not to “overthink it”, but also acknowledged centre is a less demanding position.

But former Blues coach Brad Fittler – who was the one to play Trbojevic at centre – suggested Trbojevic could be just as dangerous if he switched positions.

“If you look at what we did in Origin, just play him at centre and then he comes in when he wants – he doesn’t have to do as much,” Fittler explained.

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“I don’t know how many people you could do this with because he is very intelligent, (but tell him) ‘mate, just go and chase the ball’, and he will pick and choose his times. 

“It was incredible. He scored tries next to Latrell on the left.”

Seibold said he believed Trbojevic was strongest at fullback, but suggested he could also play five-eighth. 

“I haven’t made a definitive decision on it. We just want to see how he is over the next couple of weeks, see how (Koula) goes, and we’ll make the call a couple of weeks before he comes back,” Seibold said.

Trbojevic made his Origin debut for the Blues in 2018 on the wing, but was moved to the centres for the 2019 series and has played there ever since.

A switch to the centres at club level would likely represent a straight swap with Koula, who played at No.1 in Magic Round against the Broncos. Koula will miss Friday night’s match against the Storm with an AC joint injury.

Trbojevic is one of a growing list of top NRL talent watching from the sidelines with soft tissue injuries, including Nathan Cleary, Bradman Best, Cameron Munster and Kurt Capewell among others.

Speaking on Nine’s 100% Footy on Monday night, Bulldogs football boss Phil Gould said his club’s high-performance manager had showed him data that proved the game was being played faster than ever before, which was contributing to the extra wear and tear on players.

“GPS data is telling everyone in the game there are more high-speed intervals in the game than ever before … there’s a lot more vertical leaping, there’s a lot more vertical kicking, there’s a lot more vertical jumps for things,” he explained.

He said he believed the limited access to players in pre-seasons is also a contributing factor.

Fellow panellist Paul Gallen put it to Gould that would put even more strain on players, to which Gould said it could also just be an “unlucky run”.

Gould said the GPS data on his players in the clash against the Panthers in round 10 – in which Nathan Cleary picked up his own hamstring injury – was played at 123m-per-minute.

“Which is faster than Origin pace. The ball was in play for most of that time, and there was a fair bit of drain in that,” Gould said.

“There are huge demands on these players and they’ve got to be prepared for it. 

“I have my own theories on that. I’m not a high performance trainer, but I’ve seen a bit.”