A healthy crowd was on hand at No. 1 Oval to see the two Dubbo sides clash in the first Mark Melville Cup match since 2012 and there was plenty of entertainment in the first half as the Roos ran in six tries to set up a 40-7 lead.

The match was as good as over then but the Rhinos showed improvement after the break and only allowed the Roos two more tries as the score finished at 54-7.

The win moves the Roos up to second on the ladder and coach Dan Armitage was pleased to see his side put into practice the style he's trying to implement.

"It's always good," he said of a derby win.

"I think the boys stuck to the gameplan and that's what we talked about initially.

"During the week we wanted to stick to it and when you are playing in a derby you want to take that feeling out of it and concentrate on what you're doing and that's what we did and did it really well."

It took less than four minutes for the Roos to get on the board with Simon Hegarty going over untouched to plant the ball down between the sticks.

James Mata converted and kicked his second shortly after when Eli Kinscher burrowed over from close range after some strong work by the Roos' forwards.

Kinscher, who Armitage described as "fantastic" throughout the match, soon had his second to set up a 19-0 lead and the alarm bells were ringing for the Rhinos.

But the men in black and gold started to work their way back into the match through their forwards and their fans were up on their feet when Kade Goodwin broke through and set up a try to Rob Davy.

Chris Hobson brought it back to 19-7 and the game turned in to an arm wrestle briefly before the Roos' class shone through when a brilliant team move was finished off by winger Luke Ryan for the bonus point try.

Further tries to inside centre James Gilmour and Tim Bartimote made the lead near insurmountable by half-time and then almost immediately after the break second-rower John Korff powered across the line.

Central West prop Benn Wright then barged across and Mata's seventh conversion made it 54-7.

With plenty of time still left it appeared the Roos were going to really run away with it but the Rhinos stepped up again.

Their defence held firm until the final whistle and co-coach Darren Taylor was delighted with the performance in the second stanza.

"It was a much better turnaround for us there, we were hoping to work on some things we'd been doing at training and in the second half showed that," he said,

"No doubts both teams have got players out today but that's the way it is and we'll keep poking along and go back to training and try and build for the next game."

Kinscher was outstanding for the Roos while Joe Finch and Ted Bates also looked dangerous with the ball and Shaun McHugh guided his forwards around well.

Kade Goodwin showed glimpses of class for the Rhinos while fullback Ricky Wetherall again threatened without ever getting the chance to run in open play.

"We want to improve every game," Taylor said.

"I think after playing the premiers last week, when we gave them a good push, we started a bit slow today but in the second half today we really came home better."

n DUBBO KANGAROOS 54 (Eli Kinscher 2, Simon Hegarty, Luke Ryan, James Gilmour, Tim Bartimote, John Korff, Benn Wright tries; James Mata 7 convs) def DUBBO RHINOS 7 (Rob Davy try, Chris Hobson conv).