The Gold Coast secured a comfortable 36-18 win over the Panthers at Skilled Park in Round 15.
A first-half blitz was the key to victory for the home side who raced to an 18-0 lead at the break and led 30-0 soon afterwards before three late Penrith tries added some respectability to the scoreline.
Aidan Sezer kicked off proceedings after 10 minutes after a towering Scott Prince bomb was grabbed by Kevin Gordon who offloaded for the young five-eighth to score.
The Panthers looked like they might score 18 minutes later as they broke away up-field, but a Scott Prince intercept turned the game on its head as he offloaded to David Mead who showed all his customary speed in racing 70 metres to score. And six minutes later it was another turnover that hurt Penrith, with Lachlan Coote dropping the pill out wide and Steve Michaels swooping to run 50 metres for a try.
The Panthers needed to strike first in the second half but instead it was Sezer scoring his second with a 15-metre run straight up the middle to touch down unopposed.
It was game, set and match just minutes later when Brenton Lawrence raced onto a Ben Ridge offload before stepping both Coote and Luke Walsh in a 35-metre run to the line.
The visitors finally broke the drought with Walsh placing a perfect grubber behind the line for Arana Taumata to score; however any thoughts of a late comeback were extinguished with another long-range try as Mead raced clear to send Luke O’Dwyer across.
Late tries to Cameron Ciraldo and Ryan Simpkins closed the final gap to 18 points.
The Titans ran for a whopping 1910 metres to Penrith’s 1331, with 39 missed tackles and 15 errors not helping the latter’s cause.
William Zillman was impressive at the back for the Gold Coast with 193 metres and seven tackle-breaks. Michael Jennings was strong for Penrith with 153 metres, 15 tackles and two tackle-breaks.
