NORTH Queensland Cowboys coach Paul Green wants a State of Origin overhaul.

As rugby league deals with the negative headlines from the City-Country selection debacle, now the scheduling of the game’s biggest event has come up for debate.

Green wants State of Origin moved to the off-season, in October, after the NRL Grand Final, with Test matches to follow the interstate series.

The idea has its supporters given the impact State of Origin has on the NRL season, and NRL 360 co-host Paul Kent said he can see the argument growing support, particularly from club officials.

“Everything Paul Green said is completely legitimate,” Kent told NRL 360.

“It cannibalises the home and away rounds, it takes the focus away from club football, which is the lifeblood of the game.

“The focus goes to Origin and we get treated to second-rate club games — it’s almost a false economy out there.

“The NRL is always very good at measuring the upside of Orign, without factoring in the damage to the club games.”

Green isn’t the first NRL coach to discuss changing the timing of the State of Origin series, as Wayne Bennett is another who has campaigned for an overhaul.

There has been a push to shorten the series to a condensed format over a 10-day period, rather than the current six-week series.

While another option tabled has been to halt the NRL competition when the State of Origin series is on. But Kent sees no merit in such a proposal, saying it provides a free kick to the NRL’s competition.

“We have AFL and you can be sure the moment you cancel the NRL competition and put rep games on they would program blockbusters in Sydney and Brisbane,” Kent said.

“They will send out the message, ‘you cant go and watch your team, come and watch us this weekend’.

“That’s their little subversive way of gradually winning AFL fans from Rugby League.

“This is something the NRL need to sit down and seriously work out — because every year we debate it.”

The State of Origin competition is believed to bring in between $70-$100 million to the NRL, meaning any shift has to be carefully considered.

While changes can be discussed, we will see no shift in the Origin calendar at least for the next five years. The annual three game showdown is locked away as part of the next NRL broadcast deal.

Kent’s NRL 360 co-host Ben Ikin says the NRL administrators should be looking towards the future now and shaping what the Origin contest is for years to come.

“They need to start today for five-and-a-half years time,” Ikin said.

“What we start planning today is what Origin looks like post 2022.

“My solution is to drop Origin from three to one games a year — but everyone laughs at me.

“It would be massive. It started at one game a season.”