Sydney Roosters 18–28 St George Illawarra — Semi-Final, 1999 NRL Finals Series
11 Sep 1999 · Sydney Football Stadium, Moore Park, Sydney, NSW · Attendance: 31,506
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
Semi-Final, 1999 NRL finals series: Sydney Roosters 18–28 St George Illawarra, at Sydney Football Stadium, Moore Park, Sydney, NSW on 11 Sep 1999.
Sourcing caveat: All try scorers are now confirmed. St George Illawarra's five tries went to Anthony Mundine, Brad Mackay, Rod Wishart, Wayne Bartrim, and Nathan Brown — one each; an earlier version of this entry had assumed a Wayne Bartrim double, but the NRL.com scorer list names five distinct players for the five tries, leaving no room for a repeat. Sydney Roosters' three tries went to Ivan Cleary and a Brad Fittler double — the double is corroborated by other sourcing describing Fittler's brace, and the scorer list (which elsewhere in this dataset has been observed to list a repeat scorer only once) names just Cleary and Fittler for what must be three tries. Try-scoring minutes were not found in any source.
Scorers
| Sydney Roosters | Tries: Fittler; Fittler; Cleary Goals: Cleary (3/3 conversions) |
| St George Illawarra | Tries: Mundine; Mackay; Wishart; Bartrim; Brown Goals: Bartrim (3/4 conversions); Fitzgibbon (1/1 conversions) |
Team sheets
| Sydney Roosters | St George Illawarra | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ivan Cleary | Fullback | Luke Patten | 1 |
| 2 | Jack Elsegood | Wing | Nathan Blacklock | 2 |
| 3 | Richie Barnett | Centre | Paul McGregor (c) | 3 |
| 4 | Matt Sing | Centre | Shaun Timmins | 4 |
| 5 | Robert Miles | Wing | Jamie Ainscough | 5 |
| 6 | Brad Fittler (c) | Five-Eighth | Anthony Mundine | 6 |
| 7 | Adrian Lam | Halfback | Trent Barrett | 7 |
| 8 | Quentin Pongia | Prop | Chris Leikvoll | 8 |
| 9 | Simon Bonetti | Hooker | Nathan Brown | 9 |
| 10 | Scott Logan | Prop | Craig Smith | 10 |
| 11 | Bryan Fletcher | Second Row | Darren Treacy | 11 |
| 12 | David Barnhill | Second Row | Lance Thompson | 12 |
| 13 | Luke Ricketson | Lock | Wayne Bartrim | 13 |
| Substitutes | ||||
| 14 | Shane Rigon | Craig Fitzgibbon | 14 | |
| 15 | Dallas Hood | Colin Ward | 15 | |
| 16 | Graham Appo | Brad Mackay | 16 | |
| 17 | Brendan Hurst | Rod Wishart | 17 | |
| Phil Gould | Coach | David Waite | ||
Match officials
| Referee | Bill Harrigan |
Match report
St George Illawarra's attacking depth (five tries to three) proved too much for a Roosters side inspired by captain Brad Fittler's double, eliminating Sydney and sending the Dragons into their third finals match in as many weeks — the reward for having survived their Week 1 loss to Melbourne under this year's McIntyre system.