“They’ve always been a pretty left-dominant attacking side with Cody, Latrell is out there in the centres, and Fifita has just come over – it will be a good battle for us, we weren’t good enough last week, there’s no shying away from that,” Roosters representative utility Connor Watson said.
“Rob has only played a year, but is probably one of the best defensive centres in the game. You rarely see him get beaten.
“When you lose a guy like that, it ends those combinations you’ve been working with. But that’s the NRL. As a team, regardless of who is playing, we need to do better.”
Angus Crichton, who debuted for Souths, and celebrates 200 NRL games, said it was always going to take time for Cherry-Evans to adjust to Bondi life, regardless of his experience.
“It’s a whole new system, it’s a whole new outlook on footy, everything is different,” Crichton said. “People think it’s just different colours, but a lot of work goes into coming across [to a new club]. It took me a while to find my feet when I first got here.
“You have different football philosophies. The way ‘Robbo’ [coach Trent Robinson] sees the game will be different to ‘Chez’s’ coaches in the past.
“I’ve seen how much energy Chez has, he’s super excited to play, and he’s got a new-found fire in him. I know there’s too much care and hard work here in this team for it not to come to light, and we’ll keep working hard until it does.”
As for stopping Mitchell, who has shifted from fullback to left centre, Crichton said: “Latrell is a gun, he’s a weapon. On his day, he can be the best player in the league.
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“We need to make sure we’re doing everything to shut him down. We know how much he loves getting up to get a win against the Roosters.
“He’ll be fired up, their whole team will be fired up, their fan base will be fired up – we better make sure we’re fired up, too.”
