Roosters Fall To Storm At SCG

The Storm didn't escape injuries either with winger Suliasi Vunivalu suffering a suspected broken jaw and Jahrome Hughes likely to miss a week with a groin injury.

"I was real proud of our guys tonight," Storm coach Craig Bellamy said.

"I know the Roosters have got a lot of injuries. To lose a guy like Keary, he's one of the elite players in the competition. Aubusson went off as well.

"We had a couple of problems too, Hughes really battled on, Brandon Smith battled on as well, he came back on. Suli looks like he's got a broken jaw."

With two players out for the season and five more certain starters currently sidelined, the Roosters will be desperate for the likes of Jared Waerea-Hargreaves, Boyd Cordner and Angus Crichton to return soon with new recruit Sonny Bill Williams likely needing a week or two of conditioning before he is ready for NRL action.

Lam hurt his ankle in the 27th minute and last week's 300-gamer Aubusson went off with what looked like a fractured wrist after Storm giant Nelson Asofa-Solomona landed awkwardly on him in a tackle in the 35th.

The Storm may have been without the game's best player in Cameron Smith and one of the best halves in Cameron Munster but you wouldn't have known it with electric No.7 Jahrome Hughes putting in one of the performances of his career to guide the Storm home.

Prop Christian Welch, winger Josh Addo-Carr and centre Justin Olam each had arguably their best game of the season while the likes of Brandon Smith and Ryan Papenhuyzen were also impressive.

Things started going wrong early for the Roosters, who finished their first set of the game poorly, conceding a 20-metre restart followed by a six-again restart.

The Storm cashed in soon after when Hughes stepped through four defenders from 10 metres out to plant the ball down for opening points.

Four times in the first half the Roosters gave up possession inside their own half via cold drops from Matt Ikuvalu, Joey Manu and Sitili Tupouniua while debutant winger Christian Tuipulotu once ran behind his own players to give up a penalty.

That penalty allowed Papenhuyzen to kick for 8-0 while there was also a try to Olam following some brilliant left-edge ball movement from Pepenhuyzen and  Addo-Carr.

Down 14-0 after 22 minutes, the Roosters were lucky not to concede further points in the half with a Papenhuyzen try from a Suliasi Vunivalu bat-back pulled up thanks to the winger's heel scraping the touchline.

A Lindsay Collins error in his own half and a Tuipulotu error from a kick heaped more pressure on the Tricolours after the resumption with Olam crashing through some poor right side defence in the 46th minute.

Hughes split the Roosters straight through the middle from the very next set with a supporting Felise Kaufusi supporting to make it 24-0.

With Keary joining Aubusson and Lam in the sheds, the Roosters were left with just bench playmaker Drew Hutchison to call the shots in the final quarter of the game and he supplied the perfect cut-out ball to Tuipulotu to score on debut and finally get the Tricolours on the board with 17 minutes to play.

That ended up being the final scoring play of the match as the Roosters grimly defended their line from further damage with just one fit player on the bench.

The result moves Melbourne at least temporarily to first place on the Telstra Premiership ladder.