This time last week Wests Tigers were waiting to learn whether Jarome Luai would take up an eye-watering offer from the PNG Chiefs.
On Sunday night, it was the immediate future of Luai’s playmaking partner Adam Doueihi that Benji Marshall’s team was sweating on.
The depleted Tigers were thrashed 52-10 by Cronulla, their task at Ocean Protect Stadium having been made more difficult by a dislocated shoulder suffered by their halfback that forced him from the field after only 10 minutes.
Having endured three knee reconstructions, Doueihi has had a fine start to the season for the high-flying Tigers, so much so that he has been considered a chance for selection in Laurie Daley’s NSW squad.
Whether he remains in contention for a State of Origin call-up will depend on the results of scans on his right shoulder, which popped out while reaching out to score the Tigers’ opening try.
There was a further setback for the Tigers when in-form second-rower Samuela Fainu was carried from the field in the last five minutes with a foot injury.
Marshall said Doueihi was likely to be out between four and six weeks, but he was just as concerned with the “unacceptable” performance.
“We’ve worked so hard on certain standards of the way we want to play our footy and I thought we got taught a lesson by a classy side tonight on how to run hard and how to tackle hard, and how to win the field position and apply pressure,” he said.
“We got dominated, completely dominated.”
The prognosis for the Sharks was far more positive, as Braydon Trindall, Nicho Hynes and Blayke Brailey engineered a confidence-building rout before a crowd of 14,479 that lifted them back into the top eight.
Back-rower Teig Wilton and centre KL Iro posted trebles, and it was party time in the Sutherland Shire as Craig Fitzgibbon’s side scored four times in 11 minutes to compound the Tigers’ pain.
The Sharks coach had questioned his team’s attitude after a 46-34 defeat to the Cowboys in round eight, and he got the turnaround he desired.
It was a day out for 26-year-old Wilton, another player whose career has also been disrupted by injury.
“The way he plays, the players love him,” Fitzgibbon said. “I still feel like we haven’t seen the best of him because he’s been busted for three years.”
Between Luai’s watershed signing with the Chiefs from 2028 and the announcement of contract extensions for Terrell and Taylan May, it had been a big week for the Tigers.
If the retention of the May brothers was comforting, just days after Luai’s private jet jaunt to Port Moresby, news on Sunday that fullback Jahream Bula was sticking with the club was cause for celebration.
The Tigers had to cope without Bula against the Sharks, though, as he recovers from a shoulder issue, while Marshall was also without suspended co-captain Api Koroisau and in-form second-rower Kai Pearce-Paul due to a head knock.
Douehi’s early departure thinned out their ranks even further.
Cronulla’s absentee list was less extensive and co-captain Cameron McInnes was starting for the first time this season after returning from a serious knee injury via the bench last week.
Their more pressing concern had been their defence, having conceded 80 points in their past two matches.
It was the visitors who were cracked open far more often, with Trindall and Hynes zeroing in on rookie Tigers winger Tino Tavana.
The 21-year-old, playing in only his third NRL game, had a forgettable afternoon. He made a series of errors trying to defuse high kicks, as well as defensive and handling mistakes.
Cronulla took advantage. The Tigers kept the deficit to 18-10 at the break thanks in part to Douehi, who finished off a scrum play in which Luai was instrumental.
But the wheels came off for the visitors, who barely had the ball in the second half despite having the wind behind them.
Marshall and Luai said the circus the five-eighth’s deal with PNG was “no excuse” for the Tigers, who had come into the game with the second-best defensive record in the competition.
“It’s a bit of a reality check for us,” Luai said. “It’s time to put our egos aside.”
Chris Barrett is a senior sports reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former South-East Asia correspondent for the Herald and The Age.Connect via X or email.