Roosters coach Trent Robinson has revealed nobody at the club thought Victor Radley would recover in time to face Manly in their elimination final on Saturday night.
Not only did Radley play but he scored the opening try in the 40-16 win and delivered a starring performance alongside skipper James Tedesco.
Radley fractured his scapula just three weeks ago but defied the usual recovery time of six weeks and he took the field at a sold-out Allianz Stadium.
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Robinson was impressed with his gun lock but said he’ll need another big performance from his star players against the Storm in Melbourne next week.
“He’s a pretty key inclusion for us,” Robinson said.
“I don’t think anybody thought he was going to play at the start of the week except for him and he kept telling people he was going to play and then he convinced everybody around him so that was a really good job tonight.
“We missed how we wanted to play week one (of finals), improved on week two and looking forward to week three.”
Tedesco couldn’t resist poking fun at his former housemate, before echoing Robinson’s sentiment.
“He’s pretty tough, just ask him, he’ll tell you how tough he is,” Tedesco said.
“Nah but it’s pretty unbelievable to play with that injury, he should probably be out for another couple of weeks.
“But he put the team first, he wanted to do everything he could to help us get the win and he did that, he was awesome.
“He’ll be pretty sore tomorrow but he’s done a good job for us.”
Tedesco celebrated his 250th match milestone with a man-of-the-match performance that saw him score a double, set two up and run for a game-high 183 metres.
‘Vintage’ Tedesco stars in 250th | 01:10
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A nice short ball to Radley got the night started but that was only the beginning for Tedesco as he and Daniel Tupou exchanged passes down the left edge before he crashed over to score.
The pair then combined two minutes into the second half when Tedesco threw a peach of a pass for the veteran winger to score.
“It was incredible,” Trent Robinson said of Tedesco’s performance.
“He made a decision on how he was going to play tonight. You won’t see any difference in him from week to week because Teddy is quite shy so he doesn’t say too much or he’s not going to say ‘I’m going to do this’.
Robbo reflects on Teddy’s Finals impact | 08:31
“Somewhere during the week he made a decision. He’s been playing like that all year, but that was another level tonight. That was exceptional.”
It was fitting that the five-time Jack Gibson Medal winner sealed the result when he finished off a slick game of pass the parcel, with the Roosters now two wins away from claiming the ultimate prize.
Tedesco wasn’t the only one to stand up on the big stage with young half Sandon Smith bouncing back in a big way from last week’s tough night in Penrith as he beat Daly Cherry-Evans and then Tom Trbojevic to score a slashing solo try.
– with Martin Gabor
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