Crichton's rise confirms junior buzz

Stephen Crichton’s NSW State of Origin debut comes only three years after he completely won over Blues officials with his talent in his maiden underage camp.

It took just a few days in a junior State of Origin camp for NSW greats to see what basketball and GWS scouts had already spotted in Stephen Crichton – that this was a kid destined for big things.

Crichton will make his senior debut for NSW on Wednesday, coming off the bench and prepared to play anywhere in the backline when called on.

It comes three years after he was first slotted into a NSW system when chosen in Mark O’Meley’s under-20s team, when Andrew Ryan and Danny Buderus had overseeing roles in pre-season camps.

“They came to me and said teach this boy how to train and he will be anything,” former Penrith and current NSW head of performance Hayden Knowles told AAP.

“You watch him at training and he makes things look easy. He is such an athlete, you only have to watch him play basketball or anything.”

Crichton, now 21, was also well aware he had to make the jump from natural athlete to matured performer.

He was part of GWS’ Australian Rules academies in his early teens, and even trialled for Australia’s schoolboys basketball team in 2018.

But in the same week he was picked in the rugby league equivalent, and his choice was made.

“I was heaps young but my body was falling apart,” Crichton said.

“I had helps of bone bruising. My bones were growing too fast and I didn’t have the muscle to hold my body.

“I was tearing groins back in SG Ball, my hammies were too tight to play.

“But once I came into the Penrith system, they really looked after me and gave me gym programs to strengthen my core and make me last.”

Crichton was also determined not to waste his rapid rise.

Until his mid-teens he was played in the third division in local junior rugby league competitions, before suddenly finding himself in Schoolboys Kangaroos and under-20s sides.

His talent was clear, but also raw.

He debuted for Penrith later in 2019, featured in the 2020 senior Origin squad and pulled off the match-winning play in last year’s NRL grand final.

“That (under-20s camp) was what pretty much set me up and gave me a goal to get into the Blues,” Crichton said.

“I knew I just couldn’t keep running on talent.

“If you don’t have the fitness to go the whole game you will get spotted out. That’s where chinks in the armour come.”

It’s a difference noted this week by many familiar faces who first saw the gifted back some three-and-a-half years ago.

“He’s 21 and actually leads training standards now,” Knowles said.

“On day one out at Penrith I told him, ‘I am going to challenge you and make you work hard’. And there are really good leaders there that he followed.

“The difference now is he’s a full-time pro, combined with those God-blessed talents.”