With a 13th placed finish by the end of the regular season, the Gold Coast Titans had an underwhelming campaign. (Photo: Gold Coast Suns/Twitter)
The Gold Coast Titans entered the new season with vengeance. With their elimination final loss against the Sydney Roosters a distant memory, the Titans would have been looking to improve on their previous season’s result.
A win against the New Zealand Warriors earlier in the season renewed optimism for fans. However, it quickly faded as the Titans continually faced brutal defeats.
It became clear pretty quickly that a return to finals wasn’t on the cards, as 2022 went from bad to worse for the Titans.
As the losses continued to pile on, attention centred around the Titans, as they lost a few players even whilst the regular season was still ongoing.
Former captain Kevin Proctor was released, and so too was utility Will Smith, following his request to leave the club.
Gold Coast began to manage to pick up wins towards the season’s end. The wins in its last two remaining games helped the club avoid the wooden spoon and finish off the season above the Knights, Warriors and West Tigers.
Despite the late positives, the last push from the Titans wasn’t enough to keep them from remaining at the bottom end of the ladder.
Finishing position: 13th (six wins, 18 losses)
What worked?
The Titans do have a list that is young and full of talent. Whilst that talent might not have translated on the field, they are stacked with names that look set for a bright future in the NRL.
This includes captain Tino Fa’asuamaleaui, who continues to light up the field. The former Melbourne Storm prodigy headed into the new season fresh off his club MVP award in 2021, and proved why he was a worthy recipient of the medal.
Tanah Boyd (23 goals, three tries) and Beau Fermor (11 tries) contributed impressive highlights this season, while Jayden Campbell and David Fifita also stood out.
Fullback Campbell played in 14 games and made four tries, 84 tackles and 72 tackles breaks. Meanwhile, Fifita appeared in 18 games and had seven tries, 418 tackles, ten line breaks and seven line break assists.
What didn’t?
The Gold Coast Titans’ defence was poor, often struggling to hold up against the rest of the competition. The statistics don’t paint a great picture for one of last year’s finalists.
The Titans were ranked the fourth-worst defence, conceding 27.5 points per game, sitting only ahead of the Knights, Tigers and the Warriors.
They ranked just slightly worse for their attack, coming in at fifth, averaging 18.9 points per game, also fifth worst for goal scoring.
Scoring was one of the many noticeable issues that impacted the Titans. During the regular season, Gold Coast averaged just 2.5 goals per game.
Who impressed?
In what would of been a disappointing season for Gold Coast, lock Tino Fa’asuamaleaui provided a silver lining for fans.
In his first year leading the group as captain, Fa’asuamaleaui continued to impress this year as he dazzled on the field.
The 22-year-old was consistently best on ground for the team, perhaps highlighted by being the Titans’ only representative in the State of Origin.
In 22 appearances, Fa’asuamaleaui showed off his defence with 655 tackles (at a 92.6 percent efficiency).
He also had 61 line breaks, 1498 post-contact meters and averaged 14.9 hit ups.
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Season highlight:
A major highlight for the Titans was their stunning win over the Manly Sea Eagles in Round 22. The much-needed victory saw the Titans’ 10-game losing streak broken. For the first time since round 14, the Titans were lifted above last place on the ladder.
Their best performance of the season, the Titans fought back against the Sea Eagles to take out the win by 20 points.
They dominated the game from the first whistle. The Sea Eagles were struggling to get on top of the Titans, who led by eight at half-time.
As the match progressed, the Titans pushed out the lead and ultimately ended the night with a big 44-24 margin.
With Fa’asuamaleaui unavailable for the game, the Titans had stepped up and delivered a blow to the Sea Eagles’ finals plans.
Tanah Boyd, Beau Fermor, Jaimin Jolliffe, Jojo Fifita, AJ Brimson and Brian Kelly also contributed to the score.
Season lowlight:
The majority of the Titans’ entire season could be fairly labelled as a lowlight. Infrequent wins saw the team continue to see losing streaks week after week.
A four-point win against the West Tigers in Round 4 wasn’t the momentum for the Titans to see out the rest of the season in success. Instead, it saw the side lose their next five games.
Whilst they gained a win against the Dragons in Round 10, they quickly exited the winners’ circle, leading them to a losing streak of 10 games.
The Titans’ lowest losses were by 28 points. During the season, they lost by this much during their matchup against the Sydney Roosters in Round 9.
With a total of four players contributing to the score, it saw the Titans suffer one of their worst losses seen during the year.
Top off-season priority:
The Gold Coast Titans need to get more NRL experience across their playing group, as inexperience really started to show throughout the season.
Whilst Fa’asuamaleaui performed well on the field, he was often making most of the contributions on behalf of the team, and it saw him handling a lot of the workload.
Inexperience was seen in other key areas, including in the spine, with the oldest players being 23 and boasting limited NRL experience.
The losses of Smith and Proctor has also significantly decreased the age average of the team. However, the Titans gain Kieran Foran (Sea Eagles) and Sam Verrills (Roosters), which will help with adding more games to the group.
Continued development of the younger players will also be beneficial, given that many of them showed glimpses this year that impressed.
With changes such as these, Titans will hopefully be able to improve on from a rather disappointing season.
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