New South Wales captain Paul Gallen is “dumbfounded” by Blues legend Peter Sterling’s predicted Origin 17 which has Gallen missing out on selection behind David Klemmer and Andrew Fifita.

Sterling’s comments came on his own show on Fox Sports.

“I’ve gone with 11 players who were involved in that 56-6 loss last year,” Sterling said.

“The glaring omission is Paul Gallen, who was fantastic for Australia and is in really good form.

“But if I picked Gal I would have had to have left off either (David) Klemmer or (Andrew) Fifita and I didn’t want to do that.”

Gallen was shocked by Sterling’s team.

“I’m a bit dumbfounded by it to be honest,” Gallen said Sky Sports Radio’s Big Sports Breakfast.

“All I can do is go out and play well but to think that only a month ago I was out of the Australian side and I played well enough to slip my way back in there and got man-of-the-match for the Test. “I just don’t know how me not being in that is justified.

“And not just because I’m the current captain,” he said.

“I think that you look at all those players Sterlo has picked in front of me or whoever is in the side at the moment and compare our individual games and how I’m playing, I honestly think I’m playing really well and I don’t think I deserve not to be there.”