The Roosters scored a wildly impressive try against the Panthers
THE Olympics are coming up soon, so maybe the Roosters players wanted to practise as many sports as possible when scoring this amazing try.
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THE Olympics are coming up in a few months, so maybe the Roosters were inspired to try their hand at a couple of other disciplines during their clash against the Panthers on Monday night.
They razzled then dazzled their way to a try midway through the second half in the match, looking more Harlem Globetrotters than rugby league team.
Halfback Jackson Hastings struck a cross-field kick that was gobbled up by Shaun Kenny-Dowall on the right flank. He spun around in contact with the defence and chest-passed the ball netball style back to Blake Ferguson.
Ferguson then made a bee-line for the sticks but ran into a Panther who brought him to the ground. The tackle wasn’t completed though, and he managed to underarm a ball out the back to Eloni Vunakece.
The big forward with the even bigger hairdo had no time to move as he was immediately smashed by Reagan Campbell-Gillard, but as he was tumbling backwards he managed to hoick the Steeden behind him to Kenny-Dowall again to keep the ball alive.
The New Zealander then looked like he was taking a soccer throw-in as he dished the ball off to hooker Jake Friend, who restored some normality to the play by passing it to gun fullback Latrell Mitchell.
Mitchell then heeded the old adage that if you want something done right you’ve got to do it yourself, so he didn’t worry about passing and instead sped through a gap to score under the posts.
Unbelievable!#NRLRoostersPanthers #NRL https://t.co/UePmnhkyMJ
— NRL (@NRL) April 18, 2016
“That is spectacular! Gymnastics, volleyball, rugby league all in the one four-pointer,” said Fox Sports commentator Andrew Voss.
“This is not 3 o’clock in the afternoon on a sunny Sunday. This is a slippery Monday night.
“That, in context, makes that a super try. As good as you’re going to see.”
“That sort of try shouldn’t happen in these conditions,” said Greg Alexander.
“Penrith looked like they’d done enough a couple of times to shut things down but they just kept the ball alive.”
The Roosters converted to reduce their losing margin to four points, making it 20-16 in the Panthers’ favour.
It couldn’t quite spark a complete revival though, as the scoreline didn’t change after that to give the Mountain Men their third win of the year.
Jamie Soward’s kicking ensured the Panthers’ early ascendancy and then prevented the visitors from mounting a comeback as he trapped the home side again and again in their own in-goal.
In an exciting contest, also dominated up front by Panthers forward Lelani Latu who ran for over 200m, Penrith were questionably denied a Matt Moylan try late, from a pass that was ruled forward.
The Roosters remain on the bottom of the NRL ladder with just one win after seven rounds.
Captain Jake Friend was fantastic in defence for the Roosters making 65 tackles, Aidan Guerra ran for over 200m and Latrell Mitchell scored two tries.
Dallin Watene-Zelezniak scored first in the seventh minute after an early period of Penrith dominance.
Soward had stretched that lead to 8-0 after 10 minutes on the back of a conversion and a penalty goal.
Momentum then swung the Roosters’ way and Mitchell took full advantage when he barged through Moylan, Trent Merrin and Josh Mansour to score in the 19th minute.
Former Roosters prop Suaia Matagi then produced a fantastic short ball against his old club to put Te Maire Martin over on the half-hour and the Panthers were out to an eight-point lead again.
Moylan was fairly denied a try for obstruction shortly before half-time before Blake Ferguson swept aside Soward to score the Roosters’ second try after a quick tap from Jake Friend following a penalty for a scoreline of 14-10 at the break.
Waqa Blake extended the visitors’ lead five minutes after half-time when he finished off a 50m attacking thrust with a clever angled run to score.
Roosters back-rower Isaac Liu was put on report for a 10th minute “crusher” tackle on Lelani Latu.
Originally published as The Roosters scored a wildly impressive try against the Panthers
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