The Roosters’ wheels came off at exactly the wrong time. Can they go back to the future?

In the “before time” of four weeks ago, when Sam Walker still roamed the field without a moon boot, the Roosters were premiership favourites.

As James Tedesco notes, you don’t exactly forget “the best defensive performance of your season”.

The Tricolours’ stirring 12-6 upset of Penrith on August 13 wasn’t just their most recent victory. It was the club’s biggest win in years, finally shaking the chokehold Ivan and Nathan Cleary had held them in – to the tune of an 11-1 record – in the six-again era.

They rattled Nathan like never before, regularly rushing up on the champion No.7 given Isaah Yeo was sidelined, shutting down Penrith’s attack with goal line defence (occasionally illegal) that harked back to their halcyon 2018-19 premiership-winning days.

Ten days later, the Roosters lost to the Tigers. They’re still yet to fully recover.

Walker went down the following week against the Dolphins, and Trent Robinson chose to cut his losses and rest nine of his best players for the local derby against the Rabbitohs, which they lost by 30.

That Panthers breakthrough capped an eight-game winning run, in which they conceded a miserly 12.8 points a game (the best record of any side over that period).

The rhythm that went out the window in a bludging Sunday afternoon, 25-24 loss to the Tigers briefly returned against the Dolphins a week later.

But both losses were set up by alarming defensive lapses – the kind Penrith have taken and beaten teams senseless with for years now.

The Roosters coughed up three tries between the 19th and 26th minutes to the Tigers – two down their right edge and another directly from a fumbled pass on their own line.

The Dolphins peeled off three tries in nine minutes before half-time, targeting Daly Cherry-Evans and Rob Toia’s suspect decision-making on the Roosters’ left.

“When things don’t go our way, we’ve struggled to get back to what we do well,” Tedesco says – having been sidelined (and rested) for all bar the Dolphins game in the past month.

“We can’t let things snowball, and in those games, one bad thing has led to another. So I think that’s on me as captain and the leaders to help fix that up against Penrith. Things aren’t always going to go perfectly. But you can’t let that slide for 15-20 minutes either. You have to move onto the next job and recover.”

How the Roosters’ attack recovers without the enigmatic Walker and adjusts to the probable scrum-base combination of Daly Cherry-Evans and Hugo Savala is key.

“Maybe they become a little more structured,” champion playmaker and ex-Roosters halves coach Cooper Cronk says.

“Maybe they [adopt] a little bit more of a set-play mentality – play one, two, three [settling plays] and then play off the back of that.

“Sam Walker’s effectiveness is his unpredictability. Maybe the Roosters narrow that down a bit and start doing a little bit of sequence play to get the best out of Savala and Cherry-Evans.”

The returns of Victor Radley (concussion), Daniel Tupou (back last week from a lengthy shoulder injury) and Angus Crichton (broken foot) can’t be overstated.

The Roosters attack was the definition of clunky against the Tigers. Without Radley holding them together in the middle, and then understandably when rocked by Walker’s injury, they were listless for much of the Dolphins clash too.

For all their attacking wares, the Roosters haven’t been that flash attacking from inside the opposition’s 20-metre zone all season.

But the 43 tackles they had pressing the Tigers’ line, and 38 doing the same from inside the Dolphins’ 20, should have been enough to win both matches by their standards.

The Roosters have still scored the most tries from kicks (33) of any team this season. But of late, one of their best attacking weapons has been holstered – Rex Bassingthwaighte’s 79th-minute try against the Rabbitohs last week was their first from the boot in a month.

Recent form, pundits, punters and the bookies alike give the Bondi-based side little hope against the Panthers. The Penrith juggernaut does seem to be rolling once more, with Yeo back in the middle and Cleary as imperious as ever.

But Robinson and the Roosters have been here before – losing back-to-back games late in their 2013 and 2018 premiership runs, with a 2013 upset loss to the Gold Coast especially memorable given the Titans were $12 outsiders at kick-off.

And even without main man Walker, the Roosters still boast an array of talent and firepower that most NRL rivals could only dream of. And they know it.

“We know we’ve got the X-factor to compete with anyone,” Tedesco says.

“And especially against Penrith, you can’t hold back or play too safe. But we have to be ready to do the tough things first, and that starts with our defence and our kick-chase – doing those little things right will earn us the chance to play our style of footy and then put some pressure on them.”

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Dan Walsh is a sports reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X or email.AdvertisementAdvertisement