2016
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Looks like they had a purple patch about 10 years ago
Finishes the last 8 years of
16, 12, 9, 14, 14, 8, 15, 14 is not pretty viewing
It's important to have historical context when discussing the Titans/rugby league on the Gold Coast. I won't go back to the very start but I'll try to explain what happened before the Titans were established.Looks like they had a purple patch about 10 years ago
Finishes the last 8 years of
16, 12, 9, 14, 14, 8, 15, 14 is not pretty viewing
It's important to have historical context when discussing the Titans/rugby league on the Gold Coast. I won't go back to the very start but I'll try to explain what happened before the Titans were established.
The Gold Coast Chargers were one of the casualties of what was known as the 'Super League War' in the late 90s. The Chargers played home games at Carrara Stadium (our stadium) and despite being financial well off at the time, they were cut from the competition following the 1998 NRL season. This left the Gold Coast with no professional teams in any national league heading into the new millennium and a groundswell of community/corporate support for a new rugby league team began to grow in the early 2000s. The NRL wanted an even amount of teams in their competition and actually went as far as cutting the South Sydney Rabbitohs from their competition in the year 2000 in order to have an even 14 teams. This only lasted two seasons before Souths were readmitted into the league and the NRL knew the right thing to do was to let a 16th team into the league. It was around that time that a bid team known as the Gold Coast Dolphins began touting their intentions to join the NRL. There was competition from the Central Coast and a second NZ team but the only thing that was really going to hold back the Gold Coast bid was securing government funding for a new stadium as the NRL viewed Carrara as unacceptable. Then-Queensland Premier (and now ARL Commission Chairman) Peter Beattie announced in early 2005 that the Labor government would commit $100 million to the creation of a new 25,000 seat rectangular stadium on the Gold Coast, due for completion before the beginning of the 2008 NRL season. This was it - the Gold Coast was back in and NRL CEO David Gallop confirmed their entry in mid-2005. Public surveys were conducted to determine the team nickname in late 2005 and the city decided to become known as the Titans.
Now we get to the good part. The Titans were able to secure some fairly big signings (Scott Prince, Luke Bailey, Mat Rogers and Preston Campbell to name a few) in the lead up to their first season and the GC public was very optimistic about their prospects. After finishing with decent records of 10 wins and 14 losses in their first two seasons, the Titans were ready to pounce leading into the 2009 season. Led by their inspirational skipper Scott Prince, the Titans had well and truly captured the imagination of the public in 2009 and were the hottest ticket in town. The Titans were able to secure third place on the NRL ladder in 2009 and looked a good chance to go deep in the finals but were upset at home by local rivals the Broncos and had to travel to Sydney in the second week of finals where Parramatta sent them packing by annihilating them on the scoreboard. Despite an early exit in 2009, optimism was still high in 2010 and the Titans secured fourth place on the ladder to return to the finals for the second time in their history. This time the Titans took full advantage of playing at home in a final and secured a home preliminary final after defeating NZ at Robina. The NRL made the somewhat controversial decision to force the Titans to play their home prelim in Brisbane and the Titans were heavily beaten by the Roosters at Suncorp Stadium. One agonising game shy of a Grand Final appearance for the Titans and it all began to fall apart after that moment. The Titans squad was now getting older and superstar players began to retire/decline. So dramatic was the drop that the Titans actually fell all the way to the bottom of the ladder in 2011, and this happened to coincide with the Suns' first season in the AFL.
Since then, the Titans have struggled quite a bit financially and have looked close to folding multiple times. Committing huge amounts of their salary cap to underperforming marquee players and off field issues have added to the struggles for the Titans. The one notable highlight they have had since that 2010 prelim was in 2016 when they just scraped into the finals but were unsurprisingly eliminated in the first week of finals and were back to second last in the league in 2017. Now you might ask yourself, 'how could a team that had so much community support 10 years ago be struggling this much?' Well, part of the reason may have to do with the majority of the GC public being fickle and only showing interest when the team is consistently winning, but perhaps the bigger problem is the rumour that surrounded Centre of Excellence debacle. Mr Bods can probably go into this further but essentially the rumour has to do with a large amount of tradies not being paid by the Titans when they built the Centre of Excellence (now owned by Bond University). Some say a large portion of the working class community on the Gold Coast turned their back on the Titans as a result.
So there you go. There's a very quick version of what's transpired and why the Titans have really struggled for the last 10 years. We (the Suns) would have copped so much more had the Titans been successful over the last 10 years but it's hard to throw stones when you're losing as well. These days I see the two teams as having a similar amount of support from the Gold Coast community but we're yet to see the kind of support a finals bound Suns team would receive. So there are still unknown variables at this stage.
It's important to have historical context when discussing the Titans/rugby league on the Gold Coast. I won't go back to the very start but I'll try to explain what happened before the Titans were established.
The Gold Coast Chargers were one of the casualties of what was known as the 'Super League War' in the late 90s. The Chargers played home games at Carrara Stadium (our stadium) and despite being financial well off at the time, they were cut from the competition following the 1998 NRL season. This left the Gold Coast with no professional teams in any national league heading into the new millennium and a groundswell of community/corporate support for a new rugby league team began to grow in the early 2000s. The NRL wanted an even amount of teams in their competition and actually went as far as cutting the South Sydney Rabbitohs from their competition in the year 2000 in order to have an even 14 teams. This only lasted two seasons before Souths were readmitted into the league and the NRL knew the right thing to do was to let a 16th team into the league. It was around that time that a bid team known as the Gold Coast Dolphins began touting their intentions to join the NRL. There was competition from the Central Coast and a second NZ team but the only thing that was really going to hold back the Gold Coast bid was securing government funding for a new stadium as the NRL viewed Carrara as unacceptable. Then-Queensland Premier (and now ARL Commission Chairman) Peter Beattie announced in early 2005 that the Labor government would commit $100 million to the creation of a new 25,000 seat rectangular stadium on the Gold Coast, due for completion before the beginning of the 2008 NRL season. This was it - the Gold Coast was back in and NRL CEO David Gallop confirmed their entry in mid-2005. Public surveys were conducted to determine the team nickname in late 2005 and the city decided to become known as the Titans.
Now we get to the good part. The Titans were able to secure some fairly big signings (Scott Prince, Luke Bailey, Mat Rogers and Preston Campbell to name a few) in the lead up to their first season and the GC public was very optimistic about their prospects. After finishing with decent records of 10 wins and 14 losses in their first two seasons, the Titans were ready to pounce leading into the 2009 season. Led by their inspirational skipper Scott Prince, the Titans had well and truly captured the imagination of the public in 2009 and were the hottest ticket in town. The Titans were able to secure third place on the NRL ladder in 2009 and looked a good chance to go deep in the finals but were upset at home by local rivals the Broncos and had to travel to Sydney in the second week of finals where Parramatta sent them packing by annihilating them on the scoreboard. Despite an early exit in 2009, optimism was still high in 2010 and the Titans secured fourth place on the ladder to return to the finals for the second time in their history. This time the Titans took full advantage of playing at home in a final and secured a home preliminary final after defeating NZ at Robina. The NRL made the somewhat controversial decision to force the Titans to play their home prelim in Brisbane and the Titans were heavily beaten by the Roosters at Suncorp Stadium. One agonising game shy of a Grand Final appearance for the Titans and it all began to fall apart after that moment. The Titans squad was now getting older and superstar players began to retire/decline. So dramatic was the drop that the Titans actually fell all the way to the bottom of the ladder in 2011, and this happened to coincide with the Suns' first season in the AFL.
Since then, the Titans have struggled quite a bit financially and have looked close to folding multiple times. Committing huge amounts of their salary cap to underperforming marquee players and off field issues have added to the struggles for the Titans. The one notable highlight they have had since that 2010 prelim was in 2016 when they just scraped into the finals but were unsurprisingly eliminated in the first week of finals and were back to second last in the league in 2017. Now you might ask yourself, 'how could a team that had so much community support 10 years ago be struggling this much?' Well, part of the reason may have to do with the majority of the GC public being fickle and only showing interest when the team is consistently winning, but perhaps the bigger problem is the rumour that surrounded Centre of Excellence debacle. Mr Bods can probably go into this further but essentially the rumour has to do with a large amount of tradies not being paid by the Titans when they built the Centre of Excellence (now owned by Bond University). Some say a large portion of the working class community on the Gold Coast turned their back on the Titans as a result.
So there you go. There's a very quick version of what's transpired and why the Titans have really struggled for the last 10 years. We (the Suns) would have copped so much more had the Titans been successful over the last 10 years but it's hard to throw stones when you're losing as well. These days I see the two teams as having a similar amount of support from the Gold Coast community but we're yet to see the kind of support a finals bound Suns team would receive. So there are still unknown variables at this stage.
Back in the late 2000s you couldn't really live here as a young adult/teenager without being convinced to attend a Titans game. We all did it, regardless of allegiances to other sports. Mark Minichiello is a name I haven't thought of for a while but you're right, he was a very hard working forward for them. They certainly had some exciting players back in the day but I just don't see that with them these days unfortunately.Cheers for the run down.
I was at uni on the Gold Coast in the mid- late 2000’s and went to a number of titans games during their finals years.
Miniciello the workhorse
Preston the smiling assasin
Speedsters mead and Roberts out wide
Thought zillman would be a star but was never the same after his injuries
Past 5 years I probably haven’t watched a single game though
From my very outside view the league ladder seems to swing every year, there are a few staples at the top I guess because of quality programs ie storm, broncos.
But outside of that it seems to be a lottery, however the titans have never really recovered over the past number of years.
Got to be more to it than just post retirement.
Have they not been able to recruit names, bad coaching.
I’m hoping that our suns team won’t suffer the same fate.
Cheers for the run down.
I was at uni on the Gold Coast in the mid- late 2000’s and went to a number of titans games during their finals years.
Miniciello the workhorse
Preston the smiling assasin
Speedsters mead and Roberts out wide
Thought zillman would be a star but was never the same after his injuries
Past 5 years I probably haven’t watched a single game though
From my very outside view the league ladder seems to swing every year, there are a few staples at the top I guess because of quality programs ie storm, broncos.
But outside of that it seems to be a lottery, however the titans have never really recovered over the past number of years.
Got to be more to it than just post retirement.
Have they not been able to recruit names, bad coaching.
I’m hoping that our suns team won’t suffer the same fate.
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Back in the late 2000s you couldn't really live here as a young adult/teenager without being convinced to attend a Titans game. We all did it, regardless of allegiances to other sports. Mark Minichiello is a name I haven't thought of for a while but you're right, he was a very hard working forward for them. They certainly had some exciting players back in the day but I just don't see that with them these days unfortunately.
I think there are potentially deeper systematic problems when it comes to recruitment in the NRL. We are fortunate to have the draft system in the AFL because it allows the bottom placed teams to access the best juniors in the country, which promotes a cyclical league. Would we have been able to convince Lukosius, Rankine or King to sign for us if we were competing for their signatures against the other 17 teams in the league? I highly doubt it. The academy system is also great for us and allows us to retain 99% of our home grown talent. The Titans have issues recruiting talented Gold Coaster juniors to their club and a lot of that has to do with clubs based in Sydney (and sometimes elsewhere) establishing affiliations with high schools/local clubs on the Gold Coast. One of the best rugby league nurseries in the country, Keebra Park High School, has been consistently providing talented Gold Coast juniors to other clubs for a while now - Benji Marshall, Corey Norman and Jordan Kahu are a few names that come to mind. It seems crazy to think a club based in Sydney can just swoop in and steal juniors from another area but that's what happens in the NRL.
So we're fortunate to not be in that position. We have a fair amount of control over retaining our juniors and who we recruit.
With rugby league being the game of the working class, as opposed to rugby union being seen as the game played by the upper class, this presents a huge opportunity for the Suns to capture the hearts of the whole coast, as Aussie Rules has always been seen as a game that crosses class divides.It's important to have historical context when discussing the Titans/rugby league on the Gold Coast. I won't go back to the very start but I'll try to explain what happened before the Titans were established.
The Gold Coast Chargers were one of the casualties of what was known as the 'Super League War' in the late 90s. The Chargers played home games at Carrara Stadium (our stadium) and despite being financial well off at the time, they were cut from the competition following the 1998 NRL season. This left the Gold Coast with no professional teams in any national league heading into the new millennium and a groundswell of community/corporate support for a new rugby league team began to grow in the early 2000s. The NRL wanted an even amount of teams in their competition and actually went as far as cutting the South Sydney Rabbitohs from their competition in the year 2000 in order to have an even 14 teams. This only lasted two seasons before Souths were readmitted into the league and the NRL knew the right thing to do was to let a 16th team into the league. It was around that time that a bid team known as the Gold Coast Dolphins began touting their intentions to join the NRL. There was competition from the Central Coast and a second NZ team but the only thing that was really going to hold back the Gold Coast bid was securing government funding for a new stadium as the NRL viewed Carrara as unacceptable. Then-Queensland Premier (and now ARL Commission Chairman) Peter Beattie announced in early 2005 that the Labor government would commit $100 million to the creation of a new 25,000 seat rectangular stadium on the Gold Coast, due for completion before the beginning of the 2008 NRL season. This was it - the Gold Coast was back in and NRL CEO David Gallop confirmed their entry in mid-2005. Public surveys were conducted to determine the team nickname in late 2005 and the city decided to become known as the Titans.
Now we get to the good part. The Titans were able to secure some fairly big signings (Scott Prince, Luke Bailey, Mat Rogers and Preston Campbell to name a few) in the lead up to their first season and the GC public was very optimistic about their prospects. After finishing with decent records of 10 wins and 14 losses in their first two seasons, the Titans were ready to pounce leading into the 2009 season. Led by their inspirational skipper Scott Prince, the Titans had well and truly captured the imagination of the public in 2009 and were the hottest ticket in town. The Titans were able to secure third place on the NRL ladder in 2009 and looked a good chance to go deep in the finals but were upset at home by local rivals the Broncos and had to travel to Sydney in the second week of finals where Parramatta sent them packing by annihilating them on the scoreboard. Despite an early exit in 2009, optimism was still high in 2010 and the Titans secured fourth place on the ladder to return to the finals for the second time in their history. This time the Titans took full advantage of playing at home in a final and secured a home preliminary final after defeating NZ at Robina. The NRL made the somewhat controversial decision to force the Titans to play their home prelim in Brisbane and the Titans were heavily beaten by the Roosters at Suncorp Stadium. One agonising game shy of a Grand Final appearance for the Titans and it all began to fall apart after that moment. The Titans squad was now getting older and superstar players began to retire/decline. So dramatic was the drop that the Titans actually fell all the way to the bottom of the ladder in 2011, and this happened to coincide with the Suns' first season in the AFL.
Since then, the Titans have struggled quite a bit financially and have looked close to folding multiple times. Committing huge amounts of their salary cap to underperforming marquee players and off field issues have added to the struggles for the Titans. The one notable highlight they have had since that 2010 prelim was in 2016 when they just scraped into the finals but were unsurprisingly eliminated in the first week of finals and were back to second last in the league in 2017. Now you might ask yourself, 'how could a team that had so much community support 10 years ago be struggling this much?' Well, part of the reason may have to do with the majority of the GC public being fickle and only showing interest when the team is consistently winning, but perhaps the bigger problem is the rumour that surrounded Centre of Excellence debacle. Mr Bods can probably go into this further but essentially the rumour has to do with a large amount of tradies not being paid by the Titans when they built the Centre of Excellence (now owned by Bond University). Some say a large portion of the working class community on the Gold Coast turned their back on the Titans as a result.
So there you go. There's a very quick version of what's transpired and why the Titans have really struggled for the last 10 years. We (the Suns) would have copped so much more had the Titans been successful over the last 10 years but it's hard to throw stones when you're losing as well. These days I see the two teams as having a similar amount of support from the Gold Coast community but we're yet to see the kind of support a finals bound Suns team would receive. So there are still unknown variables at this stage.
With rugby league being the game of the working class, as opposed to rugby union being seen as the game played by the upper class, this presents a huge opportunity for the Suns to capture the hearts of the whole coast, as Aussie Rules has always been seen as a game that crosses class divides.
That's very true and it's one of the beautiful aspects to our game. You only have to look at the Gold Coast juniors and their backgrounds to see this in full flight. Traditional working class schools like PBC and Merrimac have produced the likes of Marcus Ashcroft, Ricky Petterd, Jesse Joyce, Brayden Crossley, Brad Scheer and Jacob Dawson whereas upper class private schools like All Saints, TSS and Somerset have given the league Nick Riewoldt, Kurt Tippett, Lachie Weller, Clark Keating and Ben Hudson. You even have the middle ground of government schools based in upper class areas like Benowa producing the likes of Daniel Merrett, Dayne Zorko and Brent Renouf and private schools like Marymount/St Andrews that aren't considered as elite as some of the aforementioned private schools which produce players like David Hale, Andrew Raines and Bailey Scott. Even the silver tails that are the Southport Sharks have been the envy of the smaller, working class footy clubs on the Gold Coast for many decades.With rugby league being the game of the working class, as opposed to rugby union being seen as the game played by the upper class, this presents a huge opportunity for the Suns to capture the hearts of the whole coast, as Aussie Rules has always been seen as a game that crosses class divides.
Kennedy had 30 in the twos, him, Cunningham, Marchbank and Casboult will be looking to come in for Curnow (inj), Garlett, Fasolo and Polsen. I am not sure how far away Marchbank is thoActually reading their board they are calling for
Curfew +- Fasolo out
And some variety of Kennedy, Marchbank, Silvagni, Casboult in
I will continue to speak the truth be it positive, negative or indifferent. If we have issues (injuries/academy/management) I’ll speak about it, when we have a famous win I’ll join you in celebration and Scotch it up big time.
I’m parochially Gold Coast and Gold Coast only. Given my membership type/duration, background and place in this community I bring a perspective that is unique and can only be helpful if you want the fan base to grow.
So if you get your nose out of joint because I bag out your number two team or Victoria (VFL) and it’s Media then bad luck, I’m GC.
So if you are from Perth or am a Brisbane supporter or from Gulargambone And you don’t like my contributions there’s an IGNORE option.
Freely use it.
Thanks again to the brothers of the GC that PM’d me last night In support when A couple of individuals went beyond the pale.
Ok, I think time to leave it all alone. Starting from now. No more responses on the matter! Thanks
Last year once we lost Swallow to concussion, we were gone. Holman did a great job on Cripps in our first game against Carlton last year (round 2 at Marvel). I think we will play it like against WB's Bontempelli, Fiorini and Bowes will get a taste of Cripps as part of their midfield education.So thinking about the Blues game this week, I went to this corresponding game last year and Cripps and Curnow killed is. Trying to remember if Miller had a run-with role at all? Somebody needs to take Cripps out of the game this week. I’m glad it’s not a night game this week, we have a much better record in day games. Thoughts?
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