Top-eight hopefuls Canberra are out to prove they're now the real deal by avenging their early-season thrashing by the Sydney Roosters when the sides meet again on Sunday.

A meeting between the teams in the round nine ended in a 30-4 win to the Roosters, and a performance Raiders coach Neil Henry described as one of his club's poorest of the NRL season.

But the team from the nation's capital has made significant inroads since then and are still in the hunt, with a win on Sunday possibly moving them into the eight.

With home ground advantage on their side at Canberra Stadium on Sunday, skipper Alan Tongue said the Raiders were keen to show they had come a long way since that match.

"They've got the wood on us. Earlier in the year they played some pretty good footy and totally outclassed us," Tongue said.

"But we feel that we've definitely improved a lot since then."

The statistics back up Tongue's argument, with Canberra improving to a 50-50 win-loss record since that match, winning four from their last eight.

But it's their encouraging performances in losses to powerhouses Melbourne, Manly and Cronulla that has best demonstrated their improvement.

Henry replayed the match to his team this week in a bid to illustrate how far they had come.

"We've certainly looked at our game, round nine, 22-0 at half-time," Henry said.

"We were very disappointed in our performance that day.

"It was one of probably our poorest performances ...

"We'd be very disappointed if we couldn't put in a good show this time."

The Roosters, who have spent the past two days in camp at Bateman's Bay before heading to Canberra on Saturday, will be out to restore their pride following a shock loss to Gold Coast last week.

History is against them, having not won at Canberra since 2004, but they at least welcome back backrower Anthony Tupou from a shoulder injury.

The Raiders are likely to be unchanged with Tongue and Glenn Turner battling minor injuries but fit enough to play.

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