Hall of Famer Cooper Cronk believes the Eels’ Zac Lomax experiment at centre has to end, with the legendary halfback pointing to a number of defensive deficiencies as the reason why.
According to Cronk, Lomax is “a winger every day of the week and twice on Sundays”.
The premiership winner believes Lomax has struggled defensively in his new colours after leaving the Dragons for the Eels at the end of last season.
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A key reason why Lomax left the Red V was to have the opportunity to play in the centres as opposed to the wing, where he’s spent nearly all of his NRL career, and despite a career year on the flank in 2024.
Lomax has started all four games at centre for Parramatta in 2025, but Cronk says the Eels are much better off with Lomax shifting out one spot wider.
“His performances on the wing at rep level or at different stages have been top shelf, but defensively, if you want to be a dominant centre in this competition, you have to defend better than Zac has,” Cornk said.
“I don’t think he’s a centre.”
On Monday night’s episode of Matty and Cronk, the former Storm and Roosters star pointed to a couple of defensive decisions Lomax has made this season as proof he’s not ready for a full-time move to centre.
The first of those was against the Storm in Round 1 with the latest against Manly over the weekend.
“He had tunnel vision for his opposite centre and created space for (Cam) Munster … You can’t have tunnel vision, you need to have your head on a swivel and make multiple decisions at centre,” Cronk explained.
“Again on the weekend against Manly, he did exactly the same. He only had eyes for Turbo here. Comes out of the line, which completely opens up a passageway for Ben Trbojevic.”
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Cronk explained why Lomax isn’t making the right decisions needed to play centre.
“I know he wants to play centre but you don’t play centre making defensive decisions like that,” Cronk said.
“The centre is the decision maker defensively, whether they go up or out and the winger follows. So the reason why he’s better on the wing is because he follows what someone else does in terms of making decisions.
“He’s shown me things that he is a winger every day of the week at twice on Sundays at the moment.”
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