St George Illawarra’s horror record on Mondays continued when the Sydney Roosters defeated the Dragons 19-14 at Allianz Stadium.
All five Dragons losses in the 2015 season have been on Mondays: Melbourne, Wests Tigers, Bulldogs, Souths and Roosters.
Boomtown Rats had a 1979 hit single — I Don’t Like Mondays — and it is in danger of becoming the Dragons’ theme song.
Origin hero Josh Dugan said after the game that Monday nights continued to be a problem for the Dragons.
‘‘It’s always hard sitting around all weekend watching the other games trying to get up on a Monday night but there’s no excuses, we just didn’t turn up and we let the Roosters get too much ball,’’ Dugan said.
‘‘We just didn’t compete well enough in the first half and sort of hung in there but the Roosters are too good a side to give them a head-start.’’
In front of a disappointing crowd of 10,185, the Dragons were down 14-8 at halftime, with the Roosters forwards dominant in the first half.
The Roosters targeted the Dragons left-hand side defence with right winger Shaun Kenny-Dowall, scoring two tries, getting over the top of opponent Jason Nightingale.
Dragons coach Paul McGregor made a change before the game, leaving out winger Eto Nabuli and promoting Dylan Farrell who played on the right wing with Nighingale switching to the left wing.
Nightingale, who signed a new two-year contract on Friday, engineered the first try by jarring loose the ball in a tackle on Roosters centre Blake Ferguson and Dragons centre Peter Mata’utia scooped up the ball to score. Five-eighth Gareth Widdop converted the try for the team to lead 6-2.
With the Roosters leading 18-8, the Dragons scored a try from inside their own quarter-line with eight minutes left. Farrell broke downfield where centre Euan Aitken and halfback Benji Marshall combined to send five-eighth Gareth Widdop to race 25 metres to score before he converted, reducing the lead to 18-14.
Roosters hooker Jake Friend kicked a field goal in the dying seconds.
Sydney Roosters 19 (Shaun Kenny-Dowall 2, Kane Evans tries, James Maloney, 2 goals, Jake Friend field goal) d St George Illawarra 14 (Peter Mata’utia, Gareth Widdop tries, Widdop 3 goals).
