MUCH TO GAIN FROM PAYNE CAPTAINCY
Bronco ‘hasn’t murdered anyone’
BRONCOS legend Corey Parker has declared Payne Haas is the club’s standout captaincy contender and urged Brisbane bosses to not put a line through the Origin bad boy.
Haas will face court in Tweed Heads next month after being charged with intimidating police and using offensive language during a drunken incident last Saturday night.
It is the third time Haas will be grilled by the NRL Integrity Unit after he received a four-game ban in 2019 for failing to properly co-operate with a league investigation
into incidents involving his family.
Haas, 21, was also unwittingly embroiled in former Broncos teammate David Fifita’s Bali arrest in late 2019, of which he was cleared of any wrongdoing.
The NSW arrest has put a mark against Haas’ name as new coach Kevin Walters searches for a captain ahead of the 2021 NRL season.
Walters has failed to guarantee incumbent skipper Alex Glenn will retain the job, opening the door for a number of contenders to step into the role.
Parker, a 347-game club legend who captained the Broncos solely and with Justin
Hodges, said Haas’ arrest shouldn’t cost him the job.
“From working alongside them, Payne Haas comes to mind,” said Parker, who was an assistant to former coach Anthony Seibold.
“He leads every week, his standards at training are high.
“‘Payno’ doesn’t talk often, but when he does people listen. They just do. That is off the back of the respect he gets every week on the playing field and more importantly the training paddock.
“When your captain is someone who lives up to the high quality standards then that is captaincy material to me.
“Yes, he has had a couple
of moments that haven’t shone great on him but haven’t all captains had that? He hasn’t murdered anyone.
“If you want to put things in perspective, Mitchell Pearce captained the Knights last year and he had a past. Johnathan Thurston (arrested in 2010) was one of the great captains and had a past. Paul Gallen (Cronulla) was the same, Justin Hodges, myself. We’ve all had our moments.
“I’m following Payne into battle. If he says ‘let’s do it’ then I’m following him. He has shown over the last few years ‘this is the way, this is what we’re doing’.
“He shouldn’t be ruled out
because of this.”
While Walters has left the captaincy door open, what has become apparent is the Broncos are devoid of genuine contenders on the back of claiming last year’s wooden spoon.
Despite being a Test and Origin star and the Broncos’ player of the year for the past two seasons, Haas has only played 41 NRL games and is in the infancy of his career.
Glenn, 32, is a 267-game stalwart but appears to be on the outer and is likely entering the final year of his career.
Hooker Andrew McCullough is in the mix, but has interest from the Dragons to make a move south.