NRL: Titanic struggle always on cards for Warriors

Brent Tate says they have learned from the loss. Photo / Getty Images

The Warriors admitted they didn't cope with finals football in going down to Gold Coast.

Going into Friday's match, the only Titan to have never been in a playoff match was Bodene Thompson on the interchange bench. The Warriors had six: Kevin Locke, James Maloney, Aaron Heremaia, Lewis Brown, Ukuma Ta'ai and Sione Lousi.

From the Warriors 25-man roster, 12 players had 56 finals caps and centre Brent Tate made up a significant proportion of that - the Titans had 18 players with 89 caps. That made a significant difference for the Warriors running into a booming and baying 27,000-strong crowd at Robina.

Consequently their performance was strewn with errors, especially in the play-the-ball, offload and defensive line departments.

The team were naturally downcast post-match, mainly because the glitches were driven more by anxiety and pressure than lack of ability. Many had been overwhelmed and hope there are still opportunities to showcase their talents in the finals calendar.

Walking around the dressing room, amid the swathes of bandages and the steam of the showers, glum faces peered out from every cubicle. To a man, the Warriors expressed a desire to be given "just one more chance" to prove they are worthy of progressing further.

It remained to be seen whether that eventuates overnight. Heart-warming endings come along rarely in sport, particularly in the NRL where no team from outside the top four under the McIntyre finals system has won the premiership.

In a 10-season career, the only time Tate's been with a club that didn't make the finals was last year at the Warriors when he was injured for most of the season.

He insists they learned plenty from the loss.

"I'm more confident [about our team] than ever," he said. "If we get in the same position, we'll react a lot better. In the second half when we fought back, we were brilliant."

Brown says the first thing he noticed was the furious pace. "It was fast with a lot of contact against an opposition close to their best. We threw a couple of balls that weren't on and played some footy we haven't been used to in the last couple of weeks.

"We could have stuck to our game plan more but that's easy to say until you're suddenly playing catch-up footy, panicking about how you're going to get back."

For Locke, it was a case of the butterflies that kept on fluttering.

"I thought the nerves would stop when I got out there. I probably didn't perform as well as I should have as a result. We didn't have much go our way and it takes a bit out of you when you're giving away penalty after penalty."

As with the Gold Coast losing consecutive finals matches last year, such experiences can take teams a long way.