900,000km to get to footy game but who’s counting

Retiring Warriors veteran Simon Mannering has certainly earned the rest.

According to the Sydney Daily

Telegraph the 32-year-old, who brings up his 300th NRL game tomorrow, has covered the most travel distance of any player in NRL history.

The newspaper calculated that Mannering has made 310 international flights during his NRL career, covering more than 900,000km. The Warriors have always had the downside of travel, compared to the Sydney clubs in the competition who may go a month without leaving their state.

The Auckland club opened the season against the Rabbitohs in Perth, a trip that clocked up more flight miles than some teams will reach combined for the whole season.

Coach Stephen Kearney said Mannering, who is playing in his 14th season, will make a remarkable achievement reaching the 300 mark.

“If I look at the AFL as an example of that, over in Western Australia, I only know one player who’s played 300 games for the Fremantle Dockers, [Matthew] Pavlich,” Kearney said this week.

“My point is, it’s a pretty significant achievement that he’s had to deal with all of that too, and still knock out all of the tackles that he knocks out and the minutes that he plays.”

Mannering will become the 34th player to reach the 300-mark when the Warriors face the Canberra Raiders tomorrow.

He will be the 13th player to reach

the mark having played all the games for just one club. Nathan Hindmarsh (330 games), Geoff Gerard (325) and Andrew Ettingshausen (324) are the only players in the 300 club who failed to win a premiership, while John Morris (300) won one in his rookie season with the Knights but didn’t play in the grand final.

The Warriors have a chance to give Mannering the perfect send off after booking their spot in the NRL playoffs last week, for the first time since 2011. Mannering was the skipper of the Warriors that year and they went on to lose the grand final, his only appearance in the final.

According to the official Warriors website, Mannering has played in 140 wins, 156 defeats and three draws.

He’s scored 63 tries, made 9610 tackles and 28,725 total running metres. He also hasn’t kicked the ball for the past four seasons.

A sell-out crowd is expected to be in attendance for Mannering’s 300th, with the last remaining tickets snapped up early yesterday.