Titans' superstar finally unlocked but injury could ruin it; Sheens era ...

The Titans survived an early onslaught at a heaving Leichhardt Oval to beat the Wests Tigers for the fourth time in a row on Sunday night.

The 22-10 result made it a clean sweep of Queensland clubs winning in Round 1 with the Broncos, Cowboys and Dolphins also clinching victories.

MATCH CENTRE: Tigers vs Titans teams, live score, stats, video

The Tigers were without England superstar John Bateman (rested) and coach Tim Sheens played fellow star recruit and captain Api Koroisau off the bench.

Round 1

The Gold Coast didn’t touch the ball until almost the seventh minute, but the Tigers couldn’t turn their mountains of possession into significant points.

Sheens’ men were awarded the first three penalties of the game after the Titans put both a dropout and then a kick-off out on the full.

“Can you believe this beginning,” Warren Smith said on Fox League.

The Tigers took the early points and led 2-0 after four minutes, before Titans star David Fifita broke down the left flank and put Phillip Sami over in the 14th minute.

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The Gold Coast scored again in the 24th minute when fullback AJ Brimson put a grubber through close to the line and Sami came racing through to grab his second try.

“Sami having a day out,” Steve Roach said on Fox League.

“Brimson saw there was a no one at home and Daine Laurie was caught out of position.”

Tigers second rower Shawn Blore has failed an HIA, while Koroisau didn’t enter the game until the 25th minute.

The Titans picked up where they left off in the second half as a bad misread from fullback Daine Laurie allowed Sam McIntyre to score the softest of tries.

“It looked like there was no call at the back from the Tigers, you’ve got to be really clear. But no one was, they were all looking at each other,” Roach said.

The Tigers finally got on the board when Adam Doueihi threw a dummy and sliced his way through to score from 25 metres out.

“Doueihi goes straight through. The fend, the speed, the power and the big man scores,” Roach said.

The Tigers set up a tight finish when Doueihi put Laurie through a hole from close range, but the former couldn’t make the conversion.

“Laurie just exploded onto the ball but it was the soft hands from Doueihi. Game on, we’ve got a grandstand finish coming up,” Roach said.

“I tell you what they’ll play some exciting footy if they keep that style up, when it all comes together.”

But Laurie then dropped it cold on halfway and Brimson scored from a simple set play off the ensuing scrum in the 70th minute which proved the sealer.

“A really tough win, I’m thrilled we played well enough to win. In the first half we didn’t touch the ball for seven minutes and that was through our own wrongdoing.

We finally got an opportunity then Kieran and Dave set up that first try for us and we didn’t have a lot of attacking opportunities throughout the game, but gee we defended well.

Sheens said he was disappointed but the’d seen enough to “be looking forward to next week.”

“Our discipline was good and we had great patches of d but just little things here and there broke it away from us,” Sheens said.

“Even at the end, one or two tries away there was still something in us but we just didn’t nail it and scoreboard pressure mounted and we were pushing things a little bit instead of settling down.”

FORAN UNLOCKS FIFITA

Titans fans didn’t have to wait long to see the influence Kieran Foran would have on superstar backrower David Fifita’s game.

A season-ending injury to Beau Fermor during the week meant Foran and Fifita would play on the same edge and they took just 14 minutes to produce.

Foran put his second rower through a hole with a nice short ball and Fifita then hit Phillip Sami who scored in the corner.

Fifita finished with 162 metres from 17 carries, five tackle busts, one linebreak, one try assist and he made 27 tackles but also missed six.

Foran limped off the field in the 55th minute with a knee injury and will go for scans on Monday, but Titans coach Justin Holbrook is hoping it’s just a cork.

“He’s not great. We won’t know the extent until we get scans. Hopefully not too bad. His knee has swollen up, I don’t think it’s the major one, the ACL is okay, it’s more the PCL,” he said.

“We know how good he’s been for us in pre-season so we’re hoping we’ll get him back quickly.

“They (Foran and Fifita) only really had the one training session together (on the same edge) and they looked terrific and we were really excited about the opportunity he was going to get on that edge then the first touch he went straight through.

“It’s going to be a good combination if we can get Kieran back out there quickly. Bit of luck and Foz might just have a cork, he was saying out there that he thought it was a cork and hopefully it is.”

TIGERS ATTACK WILL TAKE TIME

There was plenty made of the Tigers new-look and free-flowing attack under Tim Sheens, but Round 1 proved it’s going to take a while to click.

Halfback Luke Brooks made several mistakes which stopped the Tigers attack dead, while star recruit Api Koroisau wasn’t introduced until the 25th minute.

The hooker struggled to leave his usual mark on proceedings, while fullback Daine Laurie had a night to forget.

The final member of the Tigers spine, five-eighth Adam Doueihi, played well but it’ll take time for all four players to click as one.

“We played well in patches but I don’t think they won it as much as we lost it by way of some of our fundamental errors,” Sheens said.

“The first try they scored which came out of nowhere after we started really well did rock us a bit and we needed to get over in that next 15 or 20 minutes to bring us back to playing steady footy instead of pushing things and trying to score. Silly as that sounds, trying to score doesn’t work.

“Bringing Api into the system and making sure with our halves that we’re all on the same page and we had a little bit of success with that and a little bit of clunkiness but it’s Round 1 and a lot of footy to be played yet and we didn’t throw it in, they were still trying right to the end. The effort was there, if the effort is not there then I’m worried.”

LAURIE’S NIGHT TO FORGET

Daine Laurie won the No. 1 jersey following a tight battle over the summer with Charlie Staines, but he had a forgettable first outing at fullback.

Laurie made poor defensive reads that led to the Titans’ second and third tries, which both came from kicks.

The 23-year-old scored the next try but he then dropped the ball cold on halfway when the Tigers looked to be mounting a comeback, and AJ Brimson scored from a simple set play off the ensuing scrum.

“Trying to make things happen but just thinking about what he’s going to do before he touches the ball,” Steve Roach said of Laurie.

Sheens didn’t speak directly about Laurie’s games but revealed he’d made a point of telling players there are plenty of talented juniors at the club.

“There’s a lot of good kids coming through this club and I’ve made that point, so there will be plenty of pressure on the guys,” Sheens said.

“And that’s not a Sheens warning people because we lost the first game.

“We did lose the game but we didn’t get beat, we didn’t put our heads down and stop trying and that’s all I ask from them.”

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