Sydney Roosters completed a seemingly comfortable shut-out of the Canterbury Bulldogs in a 6-0 victory, the lowest-scoring meeting between the two sides. The Bulldogs’ front row forwards made plenty of metres but their halves Kieran Foran and Jeremy Marshall-King couldn’t create a breakthrough.
After Aaron Woods was penalised for an incorrect play-the-ball, Latrell Mitchell showed his class once again when he powered through would-be defenders to score the only points of the game.
The Bulldogs looked to bounce back but Mitchell tackled Foran without the ball after a Woods offload which led to Mitchell spending ten in the bin.
Blake Ferguson almost rounded the half off on a high for the Roosters but Marshall-King did well to stop the big winger who was destined for the right corner.
Raymond Faitala-Mariner then kept the Bulldogs in the game once more when he held up a charging Ryan Matterson.
Canterbury pressed and pressed in the third quarter of the game but couldn’t come up with plays to break a rigid Roosters defence.
Sydney Roosters thought they had sealed the match with 15 minutes to go through Ferguson. But Brett Morris completed the tackle on Mitch Aubusson before he offloaded.
Bulldogs: Mbye, B Morris, J Morris, Hopoate, Montoya, Marshall-King, Foran, Woods, Lichaa, Klemmer, Jackson, Faitala-Mariner, Elliott; Interchanges: Fine, Fualalo, Eastwood, Holland
Roosters: Tedesco, Manu, Mitchell, Aubusson, Ferguson, Keary, Cronk, Tetevano, Friend, Napa, Cordner, Matterson, Liu; Interchanges: Waerea-Hargreaves, Nuuausala, Butcher, Radley
Tries: Mitchell; Goals: Mitchell
Sin-bin: Mitchell – professional foul
Full match reports of all this weekend’s NRL games will feature in Monday’s League Express.