Brett Morris has led Canterbury to 36-14 win over the Gold Coast at Central Coast Stadium on Sunday to keep the Bulldogs inside the NRL top eight.

Needing to win to stay in the top half of the ladder, the Bulldogs forwards delivered when the chips were down while Morris came up with two key tries.

Already missing Aiden Tolman after he was a late withdrawal because of a hamstring problem, the Bulldogs were forced to undergo another reshuffle when hooker Michael Lichaa was taken from the field in the fourth minute with an ankle injury.

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It forced back-rower Josh Jackson into dummy-half, however last year’s grand finalists hardly missed a beat.

The last-placed Titans were in the contest with 20 minutes to go after James Roberts mustered a piece of individual brilliance to reduce the deficit to six points, but the Bulldogs surged again.

Earlier, Morris opened the scoring before Curtis Rona – who also grabbed a double to sit equal with Semi Radradra as the NRL’s leading try scorer – crossed for one of the most entertaining four pointers of the year.

After the Bulldogs led 12-4 at halftime, they extended their advantage when Greg Eastwood was on the spot to clean up a Trent Hodkinson grubber.

The Titans looked like they were slipping from the contest when playmaker Aidan Sezer was taken from the field with a shoulder problem but Roberts kept his side in it with a display of blinding speed when he burst through a gap and ran around Morris.

However Morris made amends four minutes later when he showed his pace to grab his second, despite the hint of a forward pass in the lead-up.

The Bulldogs piled on three tries in the final 13 minutes through Rona, Eastwood and David Klemmer.

Meanwhile, Manly have stolen a 26-24 NRL win over Canberra after their late-season charge for the finals looked set to derail in the nation’s capital.

In a see-sawing match, Manly led by 16 points after half an hour only for the home side to storm into the lead with three second-half tries helping them out to a 24-16 advantage.

Then the old Brookvale connection came good.

Veteran Sea Eagles skipper Jamie Lyon scored his second try of the match with nine minutes to go to make it a four-point ball game.

Daly Cherry-Evans then made a 77th-minute break before finding Brett Stewart on his outside, the Manly fullback diving over to level the scores.

Lyon calmly potted the conversion from adjacent to the posts to secure the unlikely win, keeping the Sea Eagles in contention for a finals spot with three rounds remaining.