Ten tries to nil, a fifth successive Mark Melville Cup, a 62-3 scoreline over arch rivals Dubbo Rhinos and the Central West first grade minor premiership just three weeks away - things are going really well for the Dubbo Kangaroos.

The Roos produced a good home-ground crowd to watch the local derby contest and they would have been delighted with what they saw.

Sure, they witnessed some of the tradesman-like forward rushes from the Roos for tries, but they also saw open rugby at its best and tries at the end.

Playmakers in this regard were halves Will Leader and Mark Daley, two of the best at their game in country rugby.

They made the ball do the work, set up the moves, called the players through at different angles that always had the opposition guessing. And there was no shortage of support players willing to put up their hands to take the ball forward.

Then when the Roos were put under pressure some great clearing kicks from fullback Will Martel got them out of trouble.

The kick and chase was also a feature for the Roos and this is a ploy that is working well and putting added pressure on their opposition.

Although Andrew Nicholson kicked a long-range penalty goal for the Rhinos in the early minutes to lead 3-0, the Roos had the game wrapped up 31-3 at half-time.

Then after Leader scored two tries in the first 12 minutes after the break and Rhinos’ coach Glen Gallagher spent 10 minutes in the sin-bin after copping a yellow card for back-chatting, the only question to be answered was: ‘By how many?’

But when the score got out to 50-3, the Rhinos played probably their best football in defence, assisted by some new energy from replacements.

For a 12-minute period they made the hits that counted and put the player with the ball on his back. This shut down the Roos attack during the same time but once they got through that period, they finished the game with a couple more tries.

The Rhinos were always going to do it tough in this game, especially without Alex Frail (suspended), Claude Gordon (ill), No.8 Nimo Navatu and second-rower Mark Reynen (both injured) - and they did against a full-strength Roos unit.