Canberra have tackled their way to a potentially vital victory over the Sydney Roosters, withstanding several onslaughts from their opponents to nick a 22-16 win.
The Raiders conceded most of the territory and invited the Chooks in, but were repeatedly able to repel them, with several saving tackles of Sitili Tupouniua, Joey Manu and Joseph Suaalii.
Ryan Sutton, Hudson Young and Elliott Whitehead were particularly impressive, as much through individual moments of effort to stop tries as the Raiders, for perhaps the first time this year, shed their ‘faders’ tag and kept up their effort for 80 minutes.
“It was a tough win,” said Ricky Stuart. “It was going to be a grinding, gritty game because we knew what the weather was going to be, and we prepared for it and played accordingly.
“We made tackles that if we had made last week, we win that one too. I think we can play better than tonight, there’s stuff we can easily improve on. There’s some areas we have to fix up, and we strive to be better.”
Trent Robinson will be irritated as old problems that had looked banished of late returned with a vengeance. Their goalline defence, once the best in the league, was suspect again and the attacking problems that pervaded early in the season were back.
The Origin absentees, particularly James Tedesco, were missed – but Robinson will still have expected better from his side.
“We were really stop start, the whole first half with penalties and errors,” said the Roosters’ coach. “I thought we lost the ruck. They were more dominant in the way that they carried.
“We asked enough questions to get the points we needed to win that game but overall disappointing to not to pressure right to the end there.
“Credit to them, they deserved to win. They scrapped hard and we let in one right through the middle of our ruck, we missed two tackles straight for tries and there was a charge down.
“We let in 22 points and then missed the opportunities that we had so ended up with the scoreline that we go. We didn’t deserve to win.
“We needed more guys to attack the moments right from the start and not wait for the scoreline to tell us to move. From the start we needed to win our battles and we missed that.”
The Roosters have been soft up the middle at times – as anyone who saw Francis Molo’s try on ANZAC Day will know – and the problems flared up again here.
It was as simple as it comes: one pass off the ruck, Adam Elliott stepping inside and the red sea parting to allow the backrower to score.
The Raiders were much more resilient in defence. Twice, Suaalii went for high balls and was denied, as was Angus Crichton.
Robinson has emphasised attacking with patience, and it paid off. After being invited back in several times by Raiders errors, the weight of pressure told.
Manu injected himself into the game, fending off several tacklers before flicking on to Tupouniua. He still had plenty to do, but had the strength to carry a few with him en route to the line.
There was an immediate response. Sutton, impressive all afternoon, was able to poke his nose through the line and offload to Xavier Savage, who picked the ball off his bootlaces and dived in.
The traffic remained almost exclusively in Canberra’s end, but their defence was outstanding. Luke Keary put Tupouniua through a huge hole to create another good ball session, but the scramble was always able to cope.
Even when the Raiders got the ball, their error rate was crippling them. Seb Kris dropped the ball on the first, prompting yet more tackling, but eventually Hudson Young forced an error that got Canberra to the sheds 12-6 up.
Young’s energy in defence paid yet more dividends. He charged down a Keary kick – exatly the sort of 1% effort plays that the Raiders were not making earlier in the year – and was able to regather and pass on to Kris to go the rest of the way.
With a 12-point buffer, the Raiders opted to sit in. Though the Roosters aren’t at their best in attack, it wasn’t a sustainable policy.
Tupouniua twice went close, with one a true trysaver from Whitehead, before Sam Walker cracked the defence, fed Crichton and he put Paul Momirovski under the posts.
Still attempting to play one out footy, Canberra then had the ball stolen from them by Siosiua Taukeiaho. Keary, who had took aim at Suaalii twice in the first half, did so again and found his man rising highest. Only a missed conversion from the touchline kept the Raiders in front.
They needed to show something in attack, and for the first time in the second half, they did. Again, it was aided by less than stellar goalline defence, as Matt Timoko was able to skirt round a poor effort from Momirovski to score.
The deficit stood at six after the missed conversion, and naturally, when given the chance, the Raiders had to go for the game-sealing field goal. They missed, gifting a seven tackle set, but some heroic defence on the last play was able to deny Suaalii and hand Canberra the victory.
Cam
Roar Rookie
He'd be an awesome fullback for a team like the Dogs, where they have no attacking options. For the Roosters, I reckon his best position is on the wing and I've seen him play some blinders with the 2 and 5 on his back. To be fair to Manu, he would have only been smashing out the game plan Robbo gave him and which Keary was delivering. I still reckon Robbo (and to a lesser extent Keary) got it wrong by not directing more attack through Walker and Crichton down the Raiders weaker edge.
Albo
Roar Rookie
Manu was always going to be heavily involved from fullback, but he plays as an individual runner not as a playmaker for the team. Sure he makes 15 tackle busts , but just the one try assist for Tupouniua. Hole running off him cannot be easy with him running all over the place looking to break tackles, rather than setting up his outside players. I don't discredit his great value to the Chooks, but I just think in playing his running style, he also stifles others in the backline.
souvalis
Roar Rookie
Well who else was going to lead their attack ? Keary was largely ineffective other than kicking, admittedly some awful ball from Watson, and Robbo has Walker playing far too subserviently to the older players to get a decent footprint in the game. 15 tackle breaks in 1 game, surely someone runs into a hole.
Albo
Roar Rookie
I'm with you regarding Manu. He has a heap of individual abilities, but little of it does anything for the Chooks teamwork. He doesn't play to set up his outside supports , and only passes the ball if he has no other option. Once he was going to play fullback, I made him captain in my SC team, and he duly delivered a shed load of double points through all the touches he had. But he had just the one try assist for Tupouniua , but didn't set anything up for his centres or wingers, which may have helped the Chooks ?
Cam
Roar Rookie
Probably a bit unfair to compare Manu's work to Teddy (who is a generational player), but I just feel Manu isn't creative enough to play fullback in a team full of attacking weapons. No doubt your boys will be a lot more cohesive once both your props are back and Tedesco is in the 1 jersey. Saturday arvo at the SCG vs the Storm, should be a belter.
Joister
Roar Rookie
Cam, no disappointment with your opinion from this chooks supporter. You nailed it in a number of ways and I'm scratching my head the same as you seem to have been. Whilst I love Manu I also feel he tried to hard yesterday and that he missed some opportunities to involve fellow players with a more direct play and extend on whatever momentum he started (kind of stuff he does when he's playing on the edge). Credit to him for saving the try. Raiders defence was brilliant and reckon Ricky Sticks would be still be smiling from that effort - even when they seemed spent they kept putting in and a well deserved win.
jimmmy
Roar Rookie
Mike , I was sure it was Big Red who charged down that kick ?
Cam
Roar Rookie
Tipped the Raiders and they didn’t disappoint. Just on the Roosters and judging by how gushing the commentators were, mine might not be the popular opinion, but Joseph Manu tried way, way too hard. 34 carries of the ball, plenty of running sideways and picking up easy tackle-break stat, but created next to nothing. Yes he ran for 300m and had a try assist, but compare his work to Tedesco the week before vs the Sharks. Teddy had just the 20 carries for 240m, 1x try, 2x line breaks, 3x line break assists and 2x try assists and emphasises quality over quantity. It was a head-scratcher why the Roosters directed 80% of their attack through their RH edge with Keary, Manu and Tupouniua. The Raiders other edge has given up 22 tries this season and the couple of times Walker and Crichton were given the ball, they looked dangerous and I reckon Robbo got that wrong. With 2 points separating 6th-11th on the ladder and with the Roosters next three games Storm, Eels, Panthers, they could find themselves outside the 8 in the back end of the season. They have a super-tough draw to finish and I’m tipping they miss the finals, with either the Raiders or Manly sneaking into 8th.
jammel
Guest
Roosters were lucky IMO - particularly that forward pass! Raiders' goal-line defence was outstanding! :) Horsborough was excellent. So too Hudson Young! and Xavier Savage / Tapine. We're still looking for more from the likes of Cotric. I'd also like Starling to see more game time....
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Roar Rookie
Good write up Mike - good tough game of footy - 12 up after the Big Red charge down 5 minutes after half time wasn't going to be enough - but they stood up in defence - were patient and held their nerve after the Roosters scored twice - and the Timoko try sealed it with 10 to go
Harry
Guest
Good write-up of a good, tough game - just one correction, though: it was Corey Horsburgh, not Hudson Young, who charged down the Keary kick and then passed to Kris for the first try of the second half. A great game by Horsburgh in his first start for the season, incidentally.