Titans have been slow starters conceding first points in five of their six games so far

THE Titans have conceded the first points in five of their six games and don’t want to be the team who let the Dragons break their points drought.

TITANS co-captain William Zillman has called for more composure among his young side as they prepare to eradicate their poor starts.

Despite a strong start to the season the Gold Coast have been notoriously slow starters, conceding the first points in five of their six games.

They have managed to fight back in every game and have gone on to win three, but Zillman says things need to change after Cronulla raced out to a 14-0 lead on Sunday.

He said the whole squad had acknowledged the problem this week and would look to fix it for Saturday’s clash with the Dragons.

“It won’t be a surprise to anyone that that’s something we’ve discussed,” he said.

“We came out of the blocks really well (last week). I thought we were definitely winning the battle in the first five or 10 minutes. Our defence was unreal.

“But then they score a lucky try like that ... it’s about being able to stay composed and get back in the contest.

“It wasn’t necessarily the fact that they scored first, it was the fact that then they put two and three tries on us very quickly.”

Valentine Holmes celebrates a try after beating the tackle of William Zillman to score.

Coach Neil Henry confirmed he had led the talks about the issue and said he had told the side they simply had to be better.

He could not put his finger on why it was happening except that the Titans needed more confidence.

“We need that confidence about defending early in games,” he said.

“We need to get into a game where we don’t concede early points.

“At the moment we get a bit nervous at times and make a rash decision and pay the price.

“Hopefully we limit the times we do that. We’ve shown we can hold our composure for large parts of games.”

The Dragons haven’t scored a point in their past two matches, losing to the Cowboys (36-0) and Broncos (26-0) during a forgettable fortnight in Queensland.

Henry said the Dragons posed plenty of threats in attack, especially with Josh Dugan, Gareth Widdop and Benji Marshall in key positions.

“We don’t want to be the team to let them score too many points,” Henry said.

“They’re a side that can really click and get some confidence around what they’re doing.

“They’ve got enough strike power to score points.”