What is Wrong with My Rugby League Team?

The Gold Coast Titans are doing my head in, big time!

Season 2022 started with so much promise. The coach was starting to put together the roster he wanted, the back office was operating the best it ever had and membership and sponsorship were up. The team had scraped into the finals in 2021, and bigger things were expected for 2022.

Yet, here we are halfway through the National Rugby League season, heading into Round 13, and the Gold Coast Titans (at the time of writing) are sitting 14th on the ladder, in a 16-team competition.

But, even worse than their current place on the ladder, last Friday the Titans traveled up the M1 to play traditional rivals and mortal enemies the Brisbane Broncos, and led 24–4 at halftime, only to be run down in the second half and beaten 35–24.

Seriously, you couldn’t make this up. How does a team of professional athletes, trained to within an inch of their waking lives blow such a lead, in such a big game?

And against the Donkeys, of all teams, the Manly of the North*.

10 Minutes of Madness

All too often this season, there is a 10 to 15 minute period in a game where the players seem to forget how to defend, they forget their defensive structure, and in general throw the game plan out the window. This “10 minutes of madness” usually precedes a stirring 20-minute comeback where they apparently “remember” how to play again, and fall agonizingly just short of winning the game, and we fans all leave thinking “well, at least they had a dig today”.

But not last Friday, against Brisbane, our traditional enemies.

Early in the second half, Brisbane gets a fair bit of ball in good position, use it well, and score. The Titan's heads are down, but there is a long way to go and they are a fair way in front. What the players don’t realise is that the weekly “10-minutes of madness” has started.

The Titans return to halfway to restart the game, and somewhere between leaving the tryline and setting up the restart, someone has had the bright idea to use the “short” kick-off. This is a play that is used when a team is behind on the scoreboard and time is running out, where the kick-off will be short and high, usually aimed at a slower forward, in the hope there will be an unforced error, and that the kicking team will recover the ball, move down the field and score.

It’s a last roll of the dice play, and if you get it wrong, you give up field position and have to defend even harder.

It is generally not used when a team; A) is in front by 14 points and B) still has 30 minutes on the clock.

So for whatever reason, the Titans kick the ball short along the ground (not even in the air to make it a contest), our best defender rushes out of the line to make the play, the ball is caught by a Broncos player, and passed to one of their quicker players, who steps straight through the gap in the line left by the defender, runs 50 metres and scores.

I deadset thought I was watching my under 10’s. This is something my Over 50’s Oztag team would do, not a team of professional rugby league players.

The Broncos kicked the goal, then scored again after the re-start, took the lead, and never looked back. They scored 3 tries in 7 minutes to win the game and shut the Titans out.

Positivity is a Choice

I’m trying to be positive, I really am, but how can a team be so dominant in one half of rugby league, and then roll over in the next 40 minutes looking like a bunch of schoolboys who had never played together before?

I’m also trying to be objective, but that’s hard too.

For answers, let’s look at where we are at.

Yes, player recruitment was limited due to salary cap pressures in the off-season.

Yes, the captain and halfback had been moved on.

Yes, one or two players well past their use-by date were kept.

Yes, there was a focus on youth in the key positions of 1, 6, 7 & 9, and with the captaincy.

Yes, the Titans have been unable to use their own training facilities as they were underwater for a long time due to the floods.

Yes, Brisbane is a resurgent side, winning their last 6 straight and moving into the top 8.

However, these men are well-paid, full-time, professional athletes.

I’m not going to accept onfield dumbarsery like the short kick-off debacle from Friday night.

I’m definitely not going to point the finger at the office and support staff, I feel sorry for them, as I know how hard they work to keep this club going.

And no, unlike many on social media, I’m not going to blame the coaching staff as they haven’t missed any tackles, dropped any balls, given away dumb penalties, or forgotten how to coach rugby league for 10-minute periods during games.

In fact, I’m going to do something that I rarely do — I’m going to blame the players.

Not that what I write or think will mean anything to some of them, but for someone who has been a fan of the Vikings, the Giants, the Seagulls, the Chargers, and now the Titans, I’m positive that the responsibility for where the team sits right now, is with the players.

And only they can fix it.

DC

*The Brisbane Broncos are majority-owned by Newscorp and are the wealthiest club in the NRL. Historically they have had a monopoly in attracting the best players in Queensland to their club by paying overs (hence the comparison to Manly-Warringah in Sydney) to the detriment of other clubs. They also have the ugliest jerseys in the competition and their fans smell of stale fish and rotten potatoes.