Soaring Sea Eagles sink Eels in historic triumph

A white- hot Manly have announced themselves as a premiership force this season with a historic 54- 0 thrashing of a poor Parramatta outfit at Lottoland.

As temperatures soared close to 40C yesterday, the Eels got burnt in their biggest loss to the Sea Eagles.

The nine- try romp also marked the fifth biggest win in Sea Eagles history, as well as the Eels’ largest defeat in the Brad Arthur era.

Arthur admitted fans had every right to criticise their performance as soft. “That’s fair. We can only go on the actions and the evidence, the evidence wasn’t great. We were blown off the park. It’s like we weren’t playing the same game,” Arthur said.

Compounding the loss was a heavy concussion to hooker Cameron King, stretchered off after copping a knee to the head from Shaun Lane.

Tepai Moeroa and Brad Takairangi also picked up head knocks in the second half, while Mitchell Moses was sin- binned for the second week in a row. The Sea Eagles were leading 30- 0 when Jake Trbojevic scored their sixth try in the 54th minute, prompting the ground announcer to lay the boot into the visitors.

“Scoreboard matching the temperature here at Lottoland,” he told the 10,502 crowd.

But the home side went on to heap further misery on a stunned Eels outfit, with Curtis Sironen and Lloyd Perrett crossing for soft tries. CherryEvans rubbed salt into the wound by sealing their first win of the season with a 68th minute penalty goal that brought up the half- century. His only flaw was a missed conversion of Jorge Taufua’s 79th minute try from the sideline, finishing with a personal tally of 22- points.