Titans brace for selection shake- up
TITANS coach Garth Brennan could wield the selection axe in a bid to fix the Gold Coast’s sloppy defence as halfback Ash Taylor battles a nagging hamstring injury.
The Titans are the NRL’s worst defensive team after seven rounds, conceding 197 points in a mixed start to the season.
The Titans have shown they are a sharp team with the football and have little trouble scoring points when they can maintain possession and build momentum.
However, attack means little when you concede too many points.
Poor ball handling and illdiscipline was crippling for the Titans in Saturday’s 26- 14 loss to the Cowboys at 1300SMILES Stadium.
The Titans conceded 12 penalties, including 10 in the first half, and made 11 errors to gift the Cowboys a 26- 2 lead.
To make matters worse, Taylor was icing his troublesome hamstring yesterday which has already caused him to miss a game this year.
Brennan delivered a gold medal spray to his troops at fulltime before labelling them “dumb” in his press conference.
And he would not guarantee the same 17 would run out at Cbus Super Stadium to face Cronulla on Saturday in the Gold Coast’s first home game since Round 1.
“You never know,” Brennan said when asked if he would show faith in his team. There were a lot of positives there.
“We’re a side that’s building. There is no need to panic.
“Yeah, I’m disappointed, but there’s no panic stations here at all.
“We need to be better than that for 80 minutes instead of playing for 15 minutes. If we do that we’ll trouble most teams.
“If we’re not going to stick to what we do all week we’re going to make it hard on ourselves.”
Despite the Titans boasting a squad that was expected to do little this season, Brennan holds incredibly high standards and has guided them to a 3- 4 start.
The rookie NRL coach will not accept what he called “schoolboy” errors, in particular players dropping the ball early in sets and from scrums.
Titans prop Jarrod Wallace said the Gold Coast had to accept Brennan’s brutal “dumb” assessment.
“We had a game plan and didn’t stick to it,” he said.