Darren Lockyer rated the Sydney Roosters the NRL’s benchmark attack after they upset Brisbane’s finals momentum with a 34-30 win in a high class clash at Suncorp Stadium on Monday night.

While Lockyer was impressed enough to tip the Roosters as genuine premiership contenders, he cautioned the tri colours would need to work on their defence after Brisbane turned a 28-6 deficit into a 30-28 lead with less than 10 minutes to play.

“They’re probably the benchmark team in attack but I think they’d agree they have to do a bit better in defence,” said Lockyer who along with halfback Peter Wallace ignited Brisbane’s spirited second half fight back.

“They’re a genuine (premiership) chance.”

Lockyer said the Roosters big forwards had done the damage up the middle after Brisbane started each half slowly.

“We struggled to hold them up the middle. They’ve got some pretty big blokes and it was a good effort to get back as well as we did,” he said.

Roosters centre Shaun Kenny-Dowall benefited from the hard work his forwards did with coach Brian Smith describing him as a superb athlete “capable of doing anything”.

When asked if Carney’s performance was Jarryd Hayne-like he said: “Gee, was it that good? .. I mean, he (Hayne) was awesome.”

Roosters prop Jason Ryles agreed with Lockyer’s sentiments about his side’s defence before their weekend showdown with Parramatta.

The Roosters let in 32 points against the Bulldogs last weekend and got away with the two premiership points again against a fast-finishing Brisbane.

“You can’t keep letting 30 points in and expect to win every week,” said Riles.

“You could feel it coming, you could feel the momentum turn out there when Lockyer, Wallace and Folau starting throwing it at us when they got some ball.”

Brisbane will await the results of scans tomorrow on utility Ben T’eo who suffered a suspected broken foot that could sideline him for up to six weeks.

© AAP 2012

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