The Gold Coast Titans have seemingly made the future of Sam Verrills very clear - it's not at Robina.

Verrills has been bumped right down the pecking order at the club to the point he is now not in the 19 on a weekly basis.

Instead, the former Sydney Roosters premiership-winner is plying his trade for the Tweed Heads Seagulls in the QLD Cup, where he has played four games, scoring a try and playing all 80 minutes in his most recent outing against the Norths Devils.

With Oliver Pascoe and this year's recruit Luke Sommerton being picked in first-grade, and doing a solid enough job, it appears there is little chance of Verrills forcing his way back in to Josh Hannay's side this year, barring injury.

With that being the case, the Titans unlikely to offer him a new contract, and the hooker already been seen meeting with Canterbury Bulldogs director of football Phil Gould during magic round, Zero Tackle have run the rule over the NRL's squads and depth charts for 2027 to determine the clubs who might be interesting having a roll of the contract dice.

2. St George Illawarra Dragons

One of the bright spots for the Dragons in recent seasons has been the performances of Jacob Liddle in the dummy half role, normally coming off the bench behind Damien Cook.

The former Rabbitoh and representative dummy half is leaving for the English Super League at the end of the year though, and the Dragons, at this stage, are in a position where they will have to rely on Liddle to play big minutes, and, more importantly given his recent history, not pick up an injury.

The Dragons do have other young hookers in their system, but it's almost not an argument to say none of them will be ready for that sort of responsibility in 2027.

The Red V won't have a heap of money to spend given they have already added Scott Drinkwater, Luke Metcalf, Phillip Sami, Keaon Koloamatangi and Connor Watson to their squad, but Verrills won't break the bank.

Given he fills the need of a starting hooker to take the sting out of the game before setting Liddle loose, and knocks over the issues if Liddle injures himself given his experience, it's two birds with one stone.

There are plenty of decisions worse than this one from a Dragons point of view.