For years, Rugby Australia has built its program by poaching top talent from rugby league, but now the Gold Coast Titans have landed a high-profile signature of their own, pulling off a major cross-code recruiting victory by securing Teagan Levi for the 2026 NRLW season.
The deal marks the end of a months-long pursuit that initially fell through. Earlier this year, both Teagan and her sister, star try-scorer Maddison Levi, were heavily linked with a switch to the NRLW, before the pair ultimately signed contract extensions with Rugby Australia keeping them tied to the Australian national sevens program through 2028. Despite that outcome, the Titans never abandoned their pursuit, and have now confirmed Teagan will join the club ahead of the 2026 season, while retaining her Olympic sevens commitments ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Games.
A six-year veteran of the Australian sevens circuit and a 2022 Commonwealth Games gold medalist, Levi brings elite-level big-game experience to a Titans side hungry to make history in the NRLW. For the playmaker, the move is a homecoming: based on the Gold Coast, she will get the chance to compete in front of family and friends for the first time in her professional career, while balancing her dual sevens and league commitments after working through logistics with Titans head coach Karyn Murphy.
“This opportunity lets me step outside my comfort zone and keep growing as an athlete and a person, and I can’t wait to do it in front of the people who supported me from the start,” Levi said of the signing. “A switch to league has always been something I wanted to pursue, but I refused to sign unless I could give 100% to Murph and this entire group. At first, it looked like balancing my Rugby Australia duties would make that impossible, but after sitting down to work through every detail, we found a path that lets me give this team my full focus.”
Levi added that the chance to help the Titans claim their first ever NRLW premiership – the first top-flight title for the Gold Coast region – is a huge motivation for her upcoming debut. “I’ve never gotten to represent the Gold Coast at the professional level before. To be able to do that, and help bring the first premiership to this region, that’s an honor, and I’m so hungry to get it done this year.”
The rugby league heritage runs deep in Levi’s family: her father Jason Levi represented the Manly Sea Eagles in the 1990s, a connection that Coach Murphy says gives Levi an innate understanding of the 13-man code. The Titans will open their 2026 NRLW campaign against the Sydney Roosters on July 4, and Murphy says Levi’s elite track record will be a massive boost to the club’s title chances.
“Bringing Teagan home to the Gold Coast for the 2026 season is a massive win for our club,” Murphy said. “She’s competed on the world stage for Australia in the biggest tournaments for years, and that big-match experience and background in high-performance environments is going to be invaluable for our whole squad. She’s already racked up incredible achievements at such a young point in her career, and we’re so excited to see what she can bring to our team. We’re committed to supporting her as she continues to develop her game across both codes. She has such a hunger to learn, and rugby league is in her DNA – we can’t wait to get to work with her in pre-season ahead of round one.”