South Sydney coach Wayne Bennett says he will continue to pick Latrell Mitchell at fullback despite weeks of speculation that the big-name signing would be switched back to centre after just two games at his new club.
In the Rabbitohs' most recent clash before the coronavirus outbreak put a halt to the league, Mitchell was shifted to left centre against the Brisbane Broncos after nearly 60 minutes in the No.1 role.
The round two clash saw Alex Johnston finish the match in the fullback position, leading many pundits to conclude Mitchell's days in his preferred position were numbered.
But with the NRL set to return on May 28, Bennett has declared his intention to persevere with the experiment, using Broncos great Darren Lockyer as an example of how it can take players an extended period of time to successfully transition into a new role.
"Latrell will be playing fullback come round three, I'm confident in him and what he brings to the team," Bennett told Fox Sports.
"I've coached a lot of players over the years and I know this guy's got a lot of talent.
"He's got enough talent to play any position on the field. The position he'll be playing for South Sydney is fullback.
"It took Darren Lockyer and myself 12 months to get his transition from fullback to five-eighth right and now there's a highway named after him.
"I've been coaching for 40 years so I know what I'm doing. One thing I'm not doing is second guessing myself. Everyone else can have their opinion.
"Latrell has the ability to turn up wherever he wants. He'll be playing fullback."
Bennett's defiant words came as Mitchell "struggled" through his first training session back, according to a separate Fox Sports report.
As the seasons gets set to resume later this month, all sixteen teams commenced training this week.
According to the author of that story, which curiously did not carry a by-line, the 22-year-old "was out of puff and off the pace."
"He was teamed up with Dane Gagai, Alex Johnston, Adam Reynolds and Bryson Goodwin and ran last among that group," the report said.
Last week the two-time premiership player became the biggest story in the game after he breached COVID-19 health regulations alongside Storm star Josh Addo-Carr, resulting in fines from the NRL and NSW Police.
Coming to the defence of his Indigenous All Stars teammate, Joel Thompson expressed his concern for Mitchell, who despite his recent off-field issues, believes there's an agenda in the form of "targeted attacks" from the media against him.
"I'm just more concerned about the agenda ... I just feel it's not okay. So I am going to make a stand now and separate myself from a lot of it," Thompson told NITV.
"Obviously they did the wrong thing. They spoke about it and owned it and they understand that. It wasn't even just that instance, I feel like, especially with Latrell. We've all seen the Adam Goodes documentary and it was quite powerful, the effects it had on him and how much it ripped him down and made him not want to continue playing.
"I feel like that's what they (the media) want because there's no other reason behind it."
Like Goodes, Mitchell is unfortunately no stranger to racial attacks. The South Sydney star regularly uses his large social media platforms to report and speak out against the negative comments thrown at him.
To back up his point about media agendas, Thompson used the example of this week's story after Mitchell and Rabbitohs teammates Adam Reynolds and Liam Knight were caught up in a coronavirus scare.
"I would love to see the amount of articles that are directed at Latrell, it's just everything. When he had a sore throat yesterday there was another two players but it was the face of him. I understand he is a world class player, but when you start reading the comments, it's just feeding these negative minds," Thompson added.
"You read some of the comments and it always turns to racism. They (certain media outlets) are fueling that.
"It burns me some of the racism that comes out. It's so disappointing how we are meant to move forward as a country when you still have this - people getting targeted like they are …
"There's some good journalists out there, but unfortunately the way things are now is, everything is about clickbait and they want that attention."
from WWOS http://wwos.nine.com.au/nrl/wayne-bennett-latrell-mitchell-rabbitohs-fullback-experiment/77d6d2ff-6bd4-4e3e-adc3-0d5fc53512f0
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