Morris injury has surface tension rising for Robinson

Sydney Roosters coach Trent Robinson has expressed his disappointment over the Brookvale playing surface after star recruit Brett Morris was injured in the first half of the 26-18 victory over Manly on Saturday night.

Morris will undergo scans on his left knee after landing awkwardly on the paddock at the southern end of the ground with a large chunk of turf taken out in the process.

Robinson's Roosters put on a first-half masterclass with four tries setting up victory but Morris's exit from the field in the 39th minute left him unhappy after a 15-minute torrential downpour softened the turf.

"That's a tough one, that was disappointing tonight," Robinson said.

"The knee went into the turf there and a chunk comes up, it digs right there and twists. It shouldn't go in that far, to be honest.

"I love coming here, this is a footy ground. Luke Keary and I were talking about it before. We came here as kids to watch.

"We love Brookvale Oval, everyone loves coming here, it's a great oval. But we need to make sure the standard of our surfaces is consistent. It's not that hard in professional sport now. We need to have professional standards across our surface.

"It's not right to bring up other codes but AFL has restrictions with the ground. It must be tested to get to AFL standard.

"There's a hardness and a softness rating and if you're not in that rating you can't hold your AFL games. We're not at that level.

"We've got an amazing ground and amazing stadium but the surface varies as we know."

Robinson said Morris was left frustrated by the injury and is hopeful of a medial ligament strain at the lower end of the spectrum.

"It's happened once before to him so it's not the first time and that's disappointing," Robinson said.

"It should've bounced off and twisted in the tackle, that's what should've happened. It stuck in the ground so I want it to be a low grade MCL."

The injury took some of the gloss off the victory, which was built on an impeccable opening 40 minutes in which Luke Keary dished out four try assists with pinpoint passes and kicks.

Keary left the field for a HIA in the second half and the Roosters seemed to lose their way as Lindsay Collins was also sent for assessment after a head clash.

Manly seized the chance to strike back and ran in three tries to pull the final margin back to a respectable eight points.

"I thought execution with stuff we wanted to get on was very high," Robinson said.

"Execution of the try-scoring plays, our kicking and end of sets were very good. Defensively we were rock solid. I thought there was a good base there.

"We were searching once we got ahead for more and that kept it at 16-0 for a long time. I thought we got to 16-0 well and just sat because we were getting ahead of ourselves. That probably stayed there for most of the game."