Gutho's my fullback, full stop: Baz backs his No.1 man

He may be facing an uncertain future at the end of this season but one thing Eels interim coach Trent Barrett is certain about is that Clint Gutherson will be wearing the No.1 jersey for the last seven games.

Speculation has been rife that Gutherson could move to centre to allow young gun Blaize Talagi to play fullback but Barrett is adamant his skipper has earned the right to stay in his favoured role at the back.

"Gutho has been a great payer of this club for a long, long time and some of it I find a bit disrespectful around the commentary towards him," Barrett told media on Thursday.

"He’s our captain, he’s the heart and soul of the joint and we all love him, so he'll be our starting fullback whilst I'm here.

"We’ll look after him and get around him and those conversations and hearing all that stuff can't be easy for him either. He has been here for a long time and I think he deserves some respect."

Now in his ninth season at the club after coming across from Manly in 2016, Gutherson racks up his 200th game for the Eels on Friday night when they host ladder leaders Melbourne, a task made all the more difficult by the club's growing injury toll.

With star halfback Mitch Moses gone for the season after rupturing his bicep in Origin Three and impressive Temora product Charlie Guymer also succumbing to an ankle injury, Barrett and his coaching staff were left with just 21 players to choose from for the Storm game.

"You’d like your conversations at the start of the week to be around football and how are we going to beat Melbourne but our front part of the week was how were we going to put a side together and that’s taxing on the players and the staff," Barrett said.

"It's the worst I've seen it but they're the cards we've been dealt at the moment but we're still going there with a goal to win the game.

"There might be a few more changes yet. I think we had 12 out, so we had 21 players to pick from and that included four part-time players."

With his team sitting just one game clear of last-placed Wests Tigers with seven games to play, Gutherson's calming influence will be critical if the 2022 runners-up are to avoid the club's first wooden spoon since 2018.

"A lot of people don't see the work Gutho does off the field and his leadership," Barett said.

"There's more to playing fullback than just what you do with the football. That position is probably one of the hardest to play in the modern game.

"You have a hell of a lot of responsibility with the ball, you play like a second five-eighth but defensively is where it’s at.

"There's been a lot of talk about Blaize, he's a young player that we need to look after, he has a big future but where his best position is, down the track that's not my call. But this I probably see him more as a five-eighth or centre than a fullback to be honest."