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It was bad enough Trent Robinson’s Roosters went into the Manly game at Allianz on Saturday night 0-3 for the season.
But it’s far worse that the lack of a decent goal-kicker robbed the Roosters of victory, despite scoring four tries to three.
Manly skipper Jamie Lyon converted all three of Manly’s tries, but Sio Siua Taukeiaho and Jackson Hastings could only manage one between them attempting to convert the Roosters’ four four-pointers.
There’s six points down the drain for the Roosters with Manly hanging on like grim death to win 22-20.
Besides, Roosters winger Shaun Kenny-Dowall deserved a better 200th game celebration after scoring his 113th and 114th career tries.
Only Lyon with 119, Brett Morris 121, Greg Inglis 134, Manu Vatuvei 146, Brett Stewart 163, and Billy Slater with 172 have scored more tries than Kenny-Dowall among current players.
And Kenny-Dowall was one of the Roosters better players last night in a vastly improved performance after last round’s embarrassing 40-nil loss to the Cowboys crossing for seven tries.
But the reality is the Roosters are anchored at the bottom of the NRL table as the only team not to win a game in four. They have the worst defence of any side with 125 points, 75 more points than they’ve scored.
That really hurts, but unless Robinson finds a reliable goal-kicker in a hurry, the pain will become a lot greater.
Sure the Roosters are missing rep players Boyd Cordner, Jared Waerea-Hargreaves, and Mitchell Pearce. More recently they lost Dale Copley with a pectoral injury, and Ian Henderson with a badly broken leg.
But there’s plenty of talent still available.
The brightest of them all is 18-year-old fullback Latrell Mitchell whose express speed to carries his 193cm, 104kg frame – this youngster could be anything in his debut season.
Add Kenny-Dowall, Daniel Tupou, and Blake Ferguson and there are four of the most dangerous backs in the NRL.
Up front there’s Aidan Guerra who is not only a Queensland Origin forward, but equally at home in the backs. In captain Jake Friend there’s one of the leading defenders in the NRL who gets though a ton of work every game.
That’s more than enough to get the Roosters off the bottom of the table and start making genuine top eight contention noises.
But all that talent will be wasted if Trent Robinson doesn’t find a reliable goal-kicker – yesterday.