Skipper Darren Lockyer believes a conscious decision by half Peter Wallace and hooker Andrew McCullough to do more with the football contributed to Brisbane's upset of Canberra at the weekend.

Lockyer revealed the pair made good on a deal to take more responsibility against the Raiders, making it a little harder for the opposition to camp on him defensively.

"Pete, Andrew and Benny Hunt had to work on their combinations a bit more after round one (against the Cowboys)," said Lockyer on Monday.

"I was in that boat.

"We had a chat and agreed we needed to get the best out of all of us.

"Just passing the footy out of dummy half is not in their best interests.

"They involved themselves more in broken field play off a strong performance from our forwards which was good."

The caution in Lockyer's voice leading into Friday's derby would be music to rookie coach Anthony Griffin's ears with the Titans reeling from the worst loss in their brief NRL history.

The Broncos will be hot favourites but, with the hindsight of 335 games, Lockyer knows the Titans will be desperate to redeem themselves, especially after foundation captain Scott Prince branded the performance as "embarrassing".

Lockyer recalled a 56-0 humiliation at the hands of Canberra in 2008 -- Brisbane's heaviest defeat -- had been the catalyst for their charge into the finals.

The fear of falling to 0-3 and under the pump so early in the season will fire up Gold Coast which is why Lockyer chose his words carefully at training to warn his players to turn up with the same attitude and defensive commitment they displayed against Canberra.

"We saw Penrith get towelled in the first round. There's always a blow torch on some team every week," he said.

"The Titans are that team this weekend.

"We need to take the same attitude to Skilled Park as we took to Canberra.

"I get a little bit concerned when things are going smooth. We've got a couple of guys coming back; we've had a good win, we're playing a team disappointed with their performance.

"We can't defend like that (Canberra) every week, eventually you're going to break."

Brisbane expect to welcome back star centre Justin Hodges with prop Ben Hannant rated a 50-50 chance of making his second "debut" for Brisbane if he overcomes a niggling calf injury.

With prop Scott Anderson's calf tear during the warm-up in Canberra to sideline him for four to six weeks, both Nick Kenny and Mitchell Dodds come into consideration.

"Hodgo and Hannant will train this week. I think Justin is definite and we'll see if Hannant gets through the week," said Lockyer.

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