Moses Mbye announced himself as a star of the future by spearheading Canterbury’s 29-16 NRL win over St George Illawarra at ANZ Stadium on Monday.
Starting at five-eighth ahead of Josh Reynolds, Mbye produced two pieces of clutch play as the Bulldogs got their season back on track with a win over the former competition leaders.
In an action-packed game, inspirational Dogs skipper James Graham suffered a worrying hamstring injury and Brett Morris staked his claim for a NSW jumper in his return from his own hamstring problem.
However it was 21-year-old Mbye who stole the show with a man-of-the-match performance.
>>Read how all the action unfolded in our live blog.
He repaid the faith shown in him by coach Des Hasler by kicking a sideline conversion to even up the scores before slotting the 75th minute one-pointer which sealed the win.
Graham lasted just 17 minutes in his comeback from a knee injury.
He will have scans on Tuesday to determine the extent of the problem.
Brett Morris showed no ill-effects coming back from his own hamstring troubles when he stopped what appeared to be a certain Eto Nabuli try early in the first half.
He now looks set to take his place in Laurie Daley’s side for State of Origin II.
The Bulldogs put in their best performance of the year as they moved into the top eight.
“At 16-10 the boys really had to show a lot of resolve,” Hasler said.
“It was great to hang in there and to bounce back. We just got back into a set-for-set mentality with them. With possession we were able to put on some points.”
After Curtis Rona opened the scoring with his 13th four-pointer of the season, Mbye produced a beautiful cut-out pass in the lead up to Josh Morris’ try as the Dogs jumped to a 10-0 lead.
While it was all Bulldogs in the first 30 minutes, the Dragons took the lead when Benji Marshall and Gareth Widdop combined for two tries either side of halftime.
After the Dragons went up 16-10 via Peter Mata’Utia, Reynolds finally came onto the field in the 69th minute and produced several big plays to turn the game.
The Bulldogs then ran over the top of the Dragons with three tries in a thrilling final 20 minutes.
Dragons coach Paul McGregor refused to blame the loss on the referees after his side was on the end of several 50-50 calls.
“The game swung a few times with a few different decisions,” McGregor said.
“We’ve got a good week to review that … I can’t go into which (decisions he had issue with) but I’d certainly like to have a good review of the game and go from there.
“But we got to a stage where we fought our way back into the game.”
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