The Surfside Buslines Titans Schools League kicks-off today!

Author: Titans.com.au
Timestamp: Wed 27 Apr 2022, 08:57 AM

The Surfside Buslines Titans Schools League has returned for another season, with 114 teams across 30 schools entered in the male and female competitions.

Thanks to a partnership with Newscorp, select games each week will be live-streamed via the Gold Coast Bulletin website each week.

To keep up to date with the Surfside Buslines Titans Schools League and watch four live games each round, click here.

The live streams will include a girls and a boys double header each week, kicking off with today’s clashes between Keebra Park and Ipswich (girls) and Southport against Beaudesert (boys).

In total, 63 boys sides will clash across two divisions in Years 7/8, 9/10 and 11/12 school grade groups. On the girls’ side of the draw, a record 43 teams have been registered to take part this season.

There will be hordes of hungry students ready to stake their claim as the best school in the southeast. But one will prove hard to beat in the Year 11/12 boys division one: Last year’s competition frontrunners Marymount College.

When asked how he would distinguish Marymount forwards Sam McAllister and Tallas Abell from each other, coach Matt Geyer struggles to separate them.

“It’s hard to speak about one without speaking of the other,” Geyer said.

The front row pair will be pivotal in the school’s Titans Cup title defence, as two of the only returning members of the victorious squad.

McAllister’s form over the past 12 months proved enough to force his way into the Burleigh Bears Mal Meninga Cup side, joined by his teammate and hooker Taj Harris.

But it is not the individual skillset of McAllister that Geyer would be relying on. Instead, it would be the way in which he and Abell brought out the best in each other.

“Both have really good skill level and work together well,” Geyer said.

“They move the ball well and they don’t mind getting in and doing the hard stuff either.

“One will follow the other (and) they work as a pair quite well, moving the ball between each other.

“I’m not a big fan of the one out hit ups, I like to see interchange of passing and change of direction and they’re great advocates for that. We’ll lean on them a lot.

“They have the seniority, so we’ll be calling on them to lead the way.

“With having quite potentially a young group we’ll need those older fellas to stand up.”

Geyer is set to field a relatively inexperienced side for the 2022 competition, with some Year 10 students expected to be called upon throughout the campaign in preparation for the Confraternity Shield later in the year.

Marymount has blossomed into a competitive force at the annual Queensland schoolboys tournament, having topped its division one pool last year only for a Covid-19 concern to halt proceedings.