Bristow bought plenty at dummy half after coming off the bench including scoring two crucial tries in the 18-8 win over Albury at Greenfield Park on Sunday.

After missing the first month of the season with a broken hand, Bristow led the way with his dangerous running game to inflict successive losses to top four rivals on the Thunder.

Injured co-coach Adam Pearce was impressed with his impact.

"It was a tough win and I thought we were going to lose it towards the end, but we scraped through and some good stuff from Lachlan Bristow got us over the line," Pearce said.

"That's what we've been missing without him out there so it is good to have him back."

Albury had been undefeated until a big loss to Southcity last week and now they've three points behind Tumut who have only lost to Tumut through the first six rounds.

The Thunder had a number of opportunities to put more points on the Blues only for handling errors to prove costly.

However Pearce was also pleased with how his team scrambled in defence.

"Our defence has been good all year and they only scored two tries despite having a lot of ball down there so we probably have to work on our attack a little bit," he said.

Albury took an early lead after a Luke Ingram intercept led to Keanau Wighton scoring in the corner after eight minutes.

However the Blues hit back when a break from Dean Bristow put Ben Roddy away to score after 25 minutes.

Tumut then pounced on a mistake at the back from James Girdler as Lachlan Bristow muscled his way over to score before he extended their lead to 12-4 at half-time with a penalty goal just before the break.

Albury got within four points after being gifted field position after two Tumut penalties when Curtly Jenkinson scored out wide but their chances of a comeback weren't helped by having English prop Brad Nicholson sin binned for a high shot on Thomas Jeffery.

While the Thunder line held strong for those 10 minutes, four minutes after his return and with two left on the clock Bristow sealed the win with another try from dummy half.

Bristow was set to be the starting hooker before the late injury derailed Tumut's plan and Jacob Toppin went into the familiar role.

Pearce said the club was still toying with the best combinations for the side but he was pleased to down one of the better performing teams after wins over Temora, Junee, Cootamundra and Brothers to start the season.

"We've been playing some of the lower ranked teams so it is good to come into the better teams and see where we are at," he said.

"We're up there but we have to keep working on things at training in attack especially."

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