Roosters Sneak Past Rabbitohs

The Sydney Roosters have narrowly avoided an embarrassing defeat to the winless South Sydney Rabbitohs sneaking home with a tight 28-26 victory this afternoon at Aussie Stadium.

Sydney look to be home and hosed when leading 28-10 going into the last quarter of an hour of the game, but a late onslaught from the Rabbitohs saw them score three tries to give the Roosters a real scare over the concluding stages.

In the end though it was goal kicking that was the difference with Sydney’s experienced second rower Craig Fitzgibbon landing four of his five attempts, while the Bunnies Joe Williams could only convert three of his five opportunities.

The Rabbitohs made a spectacular start to the game in the fifth minute when Nathan Merritt scored on of the tries of the season.

The flying winger working in limited space down the left hand touchline managed to break through the Roosters defensive line 30 metres out from his own try line and with only the full back to beat he launched a perfectly weighted chip chick which he then regathered to race away and score in the corner.

Half back Joe Williams was unable to convert his own try, but the many Souths fans in the stands didn’t seem to care after witnessing such brilliance from one of their players.

Their joy was short lived though with Sydney kicked their efforts up a notch and it worked wonders for them with lock Ashley Harrison finding winger Amos Roberts with a lovely flick pass for a well worked try in the 13th minute.

Second rower Craig Fitzgibbon had no troubles with the conversion to put the Roosters in front 6-4.

Roberts turned provider five minutes later putting a delightful grubber kick through for centre Iosia Soliola who was able to scoop the ball up and score all in the one motion.

Fitzgibbon was successful once again with his shot at goal to give the home side a 12-4 lead.

Souths looked likely to go into half time trailing by eight points, but a great offload by second rower David Faalogo enabled centre Adam MacDougall to weave through some lacklustre Roosters defence to score between the posts and make it a 12-10 ball game going into the main break.

The Roosters made a promising start to the second half pushing their advantage back out to eight points when comeback kid John Doyle dived over from close range to score his first try of the 2006 season.

Errors started to creep into the Rabbitohs game and Sydney made them pay the maximum in the 54th minute with late inclusion Jamie Soward firing a beautiful cut out pass to winger Vince Mellars who went over the left hand corner untouched.

Fitzgibbon was not able to keep his perfect goal kicking record intact pulling his attempt just left of the uprights to leave the score at 22-10.

That lead expanded out to three converted tries when David Shillington received a brilliant pass from Doyle close to the try line to barge his way over and seemingly put the result beyond all doubt (28-10).

Souths gave their legion of fans hope of an unlikely when they scored tries in the 66th and 70th minute through five eighth Ben Rogers and Williams, but the young half back was only able to kick one of the two conversions leaving the Rabbitohs still needing two scores in the final nine minutes to get their first win of the season.

In the end that missed conversion would come back to haunt the Bunnies as Faalogo scored in the final minute to leave the visitors two points shy of a rusty Roosters outfit.

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