Hammer time: Tabuai-Fidow won't shy away from No.1 mission

After laying on two tries, having one disallowed and stopping another in his NRL debut, Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow wants to replace Valentine Holmes at fullback for the full 80 minutes this weekend.

Tubuai-Fidow started on North Queensland's wing against the Warriors last Friday night but switched to fullback when Holmes was forced off with an ankle injury in the 28th minute and now hopes to wear the No.1 jersey for Saturday night's clash with Wests Tigers.

While Tubuai-Fidow is regarded as potentially quicker than Melbourne speedster Josh Addo-Carr, the 18-year-old speedster also possesses silky ball skills, which he displayed in putting Holmes and Justin O’Neill over for tries.

Tubuai-Fidow also had a four-pointer taken off him by the NRL Bunker and saved one with a cover tackle in an impressive debut that still had him "buzzing" on Monday, despite North Queensland’s 37-16 loss.

Holmes is expected to be ruled out of the match against the Tigers.

"I wouldn’t mind, fullback is my normal position and I probably feel more comfortable at the back than I do on the wing but we will see what happens," said Tubuai-Fidow, who goes by the nickname of "Hammer".

“I was on the wing for the whole week leading up to my debut and when I got chucked into fullback I was pretty nervous at the start but then I got back into the groove of it.

"Making that tackle gave me heaps of confidence. It was my first game in a couple of weeks so it was good to get back into it."

Tubuai-Fidow played at the NRL Nines in Perth during the pre-season and he said that had given him an idea of what to expect in his debut.

He put Holmes over in the 15th minute with a long cut-out pass and laid on a 41st-minute try for O’Neill.

"Every pre-season I just kept practising my ball skills at the back," Tubuai-Fidow said.

"That pass I did over to Val gave me a heaps big boost. It was probably something I have worked on, getting my passes and my skill up."

North Queensland second-rower Mitch Dunn thought Tubuai-Fidow went really well in his first outing at the top level and the mid-game switch actually helped him.

"That was probably pretty good for him, he didn’t have to think too much about it and I think with his touches he looked really good.

"I think he is only going to get better as time goes on."