Juniors Report: SG Ball Roosters Record Impressive Win

The Sydney Roosters SG Ball team travelled to Auckland over the weekend to take on the New Zealand Warriors, while the Harold Matthews and Tarsha Gale teams enjoyed a bye.

In Round 6, the Central Coast Roosters Harold Matthews team faced the Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs in a tight battle at Hammondville Oval, going down by eight points.

SG Ball

Sydney Roosters recorded an impressive 46-12 win over the New Zealand Warriors at The Trusts Arena in Auckland on Sunday.

Cassius Tia set up the opening try in the third minute, placing a pin-point grubber through the Warriors line that bounced up into the hands of his halves partner, Haydan Ritchie, who grounded the ball in-goal. Tia converted the try to give Easts an early lead.

The Warriors locked up the scores minutes later when centre Patrick Moimoi stepped inside and rolled over to ground the ball, with Etuate Fukofuka kicking the two-pointer.

Sydney hooker Benaiah Ioelu scooped the ball up from dummy-half before burrowing his was over the line to put the Roosters back in-front. Tia nailed his second conversion of the day from close-range.

Once again it was Tia who provided the spark, sending a cut-out ball to winger Noah Goodman who stepped inside and thumped the ball down on the try-line.

A smart play by Javahn Stevenson-Hala caught the Warriors off-guard, with the towering forward charging at the line, through the hands of three defenders to score.

The Roosters grabbed a scrappy try three minutes before half time, off an incredible 50 metre chip kick from Tia’s boot. Kade Maguire and Ritchie chased down the ball, applying pressure to Warriors fullback Ratu Saimone Naborisi, who dived to gain possession, losing his grasp of the ball as Maguire crashed over him. But it was Ritchie who was able to collect the four-pointer, grounding the loose ball on the line.

The Tricolours continued their onslaught into the second half, with tries to Benjamin Taylor off a scrum play, Goodman off another cut-out ball from Tia, Stevenson-Hala off a dummy-half decoy play and Jayden Smith who leapt over the line from dummy-half to ground the ball on the line.

New Zealand managed to score through a left edge play that found Rapheal Sio unmarked on the wing, but the effort was not enough to steal the win from the away side.