There will be no second year syndrome for Tino Fa'asuamaleaui with his attitude to captaincy, especially after Kieran Foran's glowing words for the Titans leader.
Officially back at Parkwood after his break from winning the World Cup with Australia, the Gold Coast skipper has set his sights on taking his game to the next level in 2023... which is set to be every opposition's worst nightmare given the freakish performances the inspirational forward delivered last season.
The 22-year-old is wanting to continually grow his capabilities as the man in charge, with new recruit Foran singing the praises of Fa'asuamaleaui's leadership in his first year at the helm.
"It's an honour to hear that [praise] from him and hopefully I can take it to another level this year with my captaincy and obviously my game," Fa'asuamaleaui said.
"With people like him, Isaac Liu and Brimmo behind me helping me out, I'll be even better."
'I want to take it to another level': Fa'asuamaleaui
Not afraid to put his hand up and take ownership of the Titans season in 2022, Fa'asuamaleaui's brutal honesty after games was one of his greatest strengths, especially with his assessment of his own performances.
"I'm definitely accountable for everyone that's out there but I think with my game, I felt that I could've done more some games and that's why I spoke about that in the [post-game] press conferences," he said.
"I just want to keep going and working on those areas that I feel I need to work on to nail them and keep myself accountable and all the boys around me."
Coming home from the United Kingdom as an International champion with Australia, the six-week experience was one not to be forgotten for the hard-running front rower, who is set to bring plenty of learnings and confidence back to Titans HQ.
"It was one of the best times of my life over there and we had some fun on-field obviously, and off-field as well," Fa'asuamaleaui said.
"I'll take a lot from that experience that I can bring back here and teach all the boys so we can aim to get better every year, but it was a good trip."
His biggest learnings from the campaign was around training and game day preparation - something that Fa'asuamaleaui is sure to look to implement for the new year ahead.
"I probably learnt to just be up every session," he said.
"Obviously we didn't have big turnarounds over there, so we just had to make sure that when we did train, every session we gave it 100% and also made sure we got everything done before game day.
"That's something I will take into this year and talk to the boys about it so we can all do the same."
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