TWO-TIME premiership-winning NRLW playmaker Jesse Southwell has been left out of the NSW Sky Blues side in a bombshell Women's Origin omission set to be announced in Sydney on Wednesday.
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Southwell, the teenage halfback who has steered Newcastle to consecutive titles the past two years, has been dumped by NSW coach Kylie Hilder in favour of other candidates.
The 19-year-old is a Sky Blues incumbent, having made her NSW debut in Origin I last year and been retained for the second fixture of what was then a two-game series.
She debuted at five-eighth in an 18-10 loss to Queensland but was then shifted to her club position of halfback for game two, which NSW won 18-14.
Her omission comes as a surprise given her appearances last year and form in the NRLW, where in 11 games last season she scored three tries, set-up a further six and kicked 33 goals.
She was also used alongside her Knights teammate and Queensland representative Tamika Upton in a photo shoot in February to promote the second women's Origin game, which is being held in Newcastle on Thursday, June 6.
Hilder will officially unveil her Origin I squad on Wednesday morning in Sydney, but it won't include Southwell.
Newcastle is still expected to be well represented through Australian-international forwards Caitlan Johnston and Yasmin Clydsdale. Dummy-half Olivia Higgins is also expected to be picked to make her Origin debut.
Knights fullback Tamika Upton was last week named in Queensland's squad.
The series opener is at Brisbane's Suncorp Stadium on Thursday, May 16 - the night before the NRL's Magic Round begins.
It's understood Parramatta's Rachael Pearson will be picked to play halfback for NSW.
She wore the No.7 in Origin I last year, but was dropped for game two.
She was also halfback when NSW won the then one-off game in 2022.
Southwell was retained for Origin II last year, but her stats didn't set the world on fire. Across both games, she failed to register a line-break or try-assist.
Her defence may also have been a concern.
A target in a defensive line, she missed 32 tackles in 11 NRLW games last year and four in two Origin appearances.
However, Pearson missed, on average, a similar amount. In six NRLW games, she missed 17 tackles and in her lone Origin game, she missed four.
Southwell and her older sister Hannah, who is not expected to be named despite previously representing NSW, played in Queensland's state competition earlier this year in order to better prepare for the Origin series, which is played before the NRLW season.
They played four games for Upton's home-town club Central Queensland Capras.
The sisters are also understood to have participated in training sessions Hilder held with a broader squad of more than 30 Origin hopefuls in recent months.
