Sydney Roosters held on to defeat Manly Sea Eagles 22-20 after a poor conversion attempt from Daly Cherry-Evans in the opening minutes proved costly.
Manly started fast and rewarded when Addin Fonua-Blake shrugged off James Tedesco with ease to score. Cherry-Evans looked to have an easy conversion attempt from right in front. But the halfback missed to the left. Akuila Uate then snuck in from dummy-half to plant the ball down for a 10-0 lead.
It had been over two games since the Roosters had scored a point that wasn’t scored by Latrell Mitchell. But Blake Ferguson broke that run on the 14th minute when he was set up by James Tedesco’s good work.
The Roosters hit the front soon after. Isaac Liu backed towards the try line, twisted and planted the ball down.
Penalties for both teams led to a 14-14 scoreline at half-time.
It wasn’t long, however, before Jared Waerea-Hargreaves opened the scoring in the second half. His try, Mitchell’s conversion and another penalty gained the Roosters an eight-point advantage.
It took until the 76th minute for Manly to respond when Uate scored his second after taking on Ferguson one-on-one but it wasn’t enough for the Sea Eagles.
Roosters: Tedesco, Manu, Mitchell, Aubusson, Ferguson, Keary, Cronk, Taukeiaho, Friend, Napa, Cordner, Matterson, Liu; Interchanges: Tetevano, Waerea-Hargreaves, Radley, Baptiste
Tries: Ferguson, Liu, Waerea-Hargreaves; Goals: Mitchell 5
Sea Eagles: T Trbojevic, Wright, Suli, Kelly, Uate, Walker, Cherry-Evans, Fonua-Blake, Koroisau, Taupau, Thompson, Lane, J Trbojevic; Interchanges: Brown, Winterstein, Perrett, Paseka
Tries: Fonua-Blake, Uate 2; Goals: Cherry-Evans 4
Full match reports of all this weekend’s NRL games will feature in Monday’s League Express.
