Injuries hurt in victory

THE Roosters’ scratchy 20-12 win over Canterbury has come at a cost, with Boyd Cordner, Siosiua Taukeiaho and Jared Warea-Hargreaves all facing time on the NRL sidelines.

The premiers came into yesterday’s match looking to reinforce their status as title favourites and, for a while in the opening half-hour, they threatened to blow the 15thplaced Dogs off ANZ Stadium.

But in front of 10,586 fans, they failed to impress in the second half yet still did enough to record back-to-back wins.

Cordner limped from the field with a calf injury in the 56th minute before Taukeiaho went off 11 minutes later with the same problem.

Cordner is expected to miss a couple of weeks, meaning the Roosters are set to be without both of their skippers with Jake Friend nursing a fractured forearm. Waerea-Hargreaves might be the latest victim of the game’s crackdown on late shots after being put on report for an off-the-ball hit on Jack Cogger.

The result keeps the Roosters in third but, after Melbourne’s loss to Manly on Saturday, they are six points off top spot. Before last week’s 48-10 dismantling of Newcastle, the Roosters had won only two of five games during a difficult State of Origin period.

They timed their run to last year’s premiership to perfection, and they showed signs they had flicked a switch yesterday as they romped to an early 14-0 lead.

The Roosters looked like they were toying with the Dogs in the first half but their advantage could have been much more. Cooper Cronk was denied because of a James Tedesco forward pass and Joey Manu put his foot on the sideline as they blew two chances in the opening six minutes.

But they failed to go on with it in the second half.