David Fifita likes to do all his talking on the field – literally.
Titans co-captain Jamal Fogarty revealed on Monday the star Gold Coast recruit has been so agitated in his two-week suspension that he’s been commentating his own runs while tormenting his teammates in training who’ve had the nasty task of trying to tackle him on the opposing side.
Fifita, who has yet to do any media interviews outside host broadcasters since the NRL season started, is walking proof of the player who likes to let his performances on the field do the talking for him.
Titans fans can expect another bold showing in his comeback against Cronulla in Coffs Harbour on Sunday.
"I think Dave is a competitive bloke by nature, when we’ve been doing opposed stuff against him and I have to try and tackle him he even commentates stuff when he’s got the ball," Fogarty said.
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"It’s good to have Dave in our team with his competitive nature. He has sort of been walking around the club a bit agitated not being able to play.
"Obviously Dave is a great player and everyone knows what he can do, just his presence on the field gives everyone around him lots of confidence and he is a major part of our team and club now moving forward.
"We don’t need him to do anything special, we just need him to do what he’s been doing for our club so far."
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Fifita’s return will further strengthen the Titans after their 30-20 win over Canterbury that Fogarty described as "ugly" but perhaps a circuit-breaker to some dreadful defensive outings in the past month.
Fogarty said the Titans were finally beginning to learn how to cope with the six-again calls that make their defence work harder for longer.
"I think as a group we can take confidence out of the weekend if we just hang in and do hard work and work together we can stop teams scoring so many points at the back end when they have so much ball and pressure with the six-agains," he said.
"We’re slowing learning how to stop that but we need to keep moving forward and working hard with our defence principles."
Fogarty was also confident his halves combination with Tanah Boyd would continue to improve, with their differing styles offering variety to the Gold Coast’s attack.
"I just try to direct the team around and be nice and calm whereas he is a lot different," Fogarty said.
"Tanah is all energy, he is like the Energizer Bunny you see on the battery ad. He has obviously got great speed.
"His best asset is his effort and energy, he is doing a good job there at the moment and hopefully we can build on that."
