RAIDERS SWAMP TITANS AT HOME
WASHOUT ALL ROUND AT CBUS
THE Titans’ bold new era has kicked off with an all-too familiar feeling after the Gold Coast were thrashed 21-0 by Canberra last night.
Mal Meninga has warned the Titans that failure is not an option this year, so the Gold Coast’s saviour may need to sharpen his knives.
The Titans lacked discipline and direction in driving rain at Cbus Super Stadium as Ricky Stuart’s Raiders kept their first clean sheet since 2013.
The Titans suffered a game-day blow when $3 million halfback Ash Taylor (quad) was ruled out and another when five-eighth Tyrone Roberts (achilles) lasted 12 minutes.
Torrential rain meant this was never going to be a freeflowing contest, but the nature of the Titans’ display was disappointing after all that had been promised.
Manly recruit Brian Kelly was one of many to give away a dumb penalty and winger Phillip Sami also got in on the action as the Titans finished on the wrong end of an 11-6 penalty count.
The Titans made 14 errors to finish with a 63 per cent completion rate and rarely looked like troubling Canberra’s defence. “We were a bit rudderless when we had the football,” Titans coach Garth Brennan said.
“Penalties hurt us, discipline was poor. We need to be better than that. We can dust ourselves off and move on.”
After conceding 582 points last season, the third worst defensive record in the NRL, Brennan was adamant the Titans’ defence would improve in 2019.
For 39 minutes and 45 seconds it held strong before a typical Titans lapse allowed Raiders veteran Sia Soliola to score on the stroke of halftime for a 10-0 lead.
The Titans were facing an uphill, or upstream given the conditions, battle when Joey Leilua scored four minutes into the second half.
From there the contest descended into an error-fest in front of 9843 drenched fans.
Former Titans chief executive Graham Annesley, now the NRL’s head of football, will hold his first Monday wrap-up today to address the weekend’s controversies and may have to explain why AJ Brimson was denied a try with 17 minutes to go that would have given some hope.
Taylor could return for Saturday’s trip to Cronulla and Roberts will undergo scans on his achilles.