It was the moment in Thursday night’s horror show that best summed up the Sydney Roosters and their premiership chances in 2025 as the visiting Brisbane Broncos piled on the pain in a 50-14 blitzkrieg at Allianz Stadium.
The Broncos were scintillating in Michael Maguire’s first game in charge as head coach.
Hulking Kangaroos and Blues prop Payne Haas was at his destructive best.
At times it looked like men against boys and that’s because it’s kind of how it was.
During the week, such is the injury crisis at Bondi, the Roosters were forced to go to the NRL and requested exemptions for two youngsters to be selected from the bench.
The Chooks had four debutants last night with three sitting on the pine.
These are the facts and can’t be disputed.
The issue for the Roosters and Trent Robinson is what happened after the whistle was blown for kick-off.
It’s easy to throw up excuses and you can be excused when you have to patch together a side – knowing you’re up against a star-studded Brisbane outfit.
But this was round one.
A brand-new campaign.
Hunger. Attitude. Desperation.
Yada.
There were signs from the opening play when the Broncos charged down the ground and swarmed Roosters enforcer Lindsay Collins and drove him into the Moore Park turf.
Collins lost the ball.
But it was a moment in the 53rd minute of the game that may have kept inspirational skipper James Tedesco awake in bed long into the Autumn Sydney night.
Already down 32-4 – the fullback was a one-man gang – fighting a losing battle in a sinking ship.
Tedesco is behind the Roosters line as Broncos centre Deine Mariner fights out of a tackle and then offloads as Roosters hooker Connor Watson tries to shut it down.
At this point there are six Roosters within ten metres of the Steeden, including three Roosters who are inactive and behind the ball.
Those three also happen to be three interchange players who should have been the freshest players on the field.
As Mariner flings the ball into the air, it’s Tedesco who enters the frame and is the only Roosters player to attack the footy and attempt to wrestle the ball back.
Tedesco then makes a second effort and changes trajectory, but Bronco Jack Gosiewski taps it back to Billy Walters. The fullback then makes a third effort and rushes Walters and makes a tackle on the utility, only for Walters to get another pass away.
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Of those Roosters, now seven players around the ball, Tedesco is the only one doing anything.
What follows on the same play is an early Try of the Year nomination with Ben Hunt finishing the passage by scoring in the corner.
“I thought our physicality and effort was really high, and I thought our smarts were really low,” Robinson said in the press conference.
Really?
Maybe Trent was watching a different game.
Roosters starting props Collins and Naufahu Whyte ran for a total of 138 metres.
Tedesco finished with 161.
Twenty-one clear of the front-rowers.
The Roosters starting pack and the bench finished with just 513.
Next up for the embattled Tricolours is a trip to Sydney’s west to face the four-time champion Penrith Panthers and they’ll be without Radley who joins Spencer Leniu, Brandon Smith and Sam Walker on the sidelines.
Goodluck.
