No achilles heel for Roosters to exploit
DALY Cherry-Evans has dared the Sydney Roosters to target Manly’s vulnerable right edge, saying it isn’t an “achilles heel” despite leaking plenty of points in last week’s mauling from Melbourne.
The Sea Eagles’ season copped a hit in the first week of the finals courtesy of a 40-12 loss to title favourite and reigning champion the Storm.
Melbourne had a field day running down Manly’s right edge, where centre Morgan Harper and backrower Haumole Olakau’ata struggled to contain the attacking onslaught.
Cherry-Evans, though, is adamant the Sea Eagles’ right edge won’t be a defensive liability against the Roosters in Mackay on Friday.
“If people want to continue to go down that path, then that is fine, but I think throughout the season we certainly weren’t an edge that was targeted or is an achilles heel of the Sea Eagles side,” Cherry-Evans said.
“Obviously, if you are letting in a lot of tries on your edge, that is going to pop up in the preview for the next side you play.
“That is understandable, but if you look at the season, our right side certainly hasn’t been an easy picking for tries.”
Cherry-Evans conceded that some teammates “assumed” Manly’s successful season would just continue during the finals.
Unfortunately, the Sea Eagles failed to match Melbourne’s methodical approach in one of their worst performances of the season.
Despite the heavy defeat, Cherry-Evans believes Manly will use last week’s Melbourne massacre as motivation to revive its premiership campaign.
“I think it was a wake-up call,” he said.
“The hard work was done to get there and maybe we had too many people just assume that it was going to continue to happen.
“But Melbourne showed us that there is still a lot more hard work to be done.
“The way they executed their game plan was really top shelf.
“I believe we can get to that level, but it was just a really hard lesson to learn in the first week of the finals that we need to take our game to another level.
“But I believe we can, and we will.”
Sea Eagles star Tom Trbojevic produced an uncharacteristically quiet performance against Melbourne compared to his usual lofty standards.
As brilliant as Trbojevic can be, Cherry-Evans knows he can’t produce his best if the team isn’t performing to its potential.
“Tom has been the product of a good team performance,” he said.
“I understand that there are the big storylines around Tom saving us and him being the only thing that does well at Manly, but the reality is there has been a lot of good work that goes on before that.
“Tom will be the first to admit that when our forward pack goes forward and our halves have provided him with good opportunities, he is the best player in the game.
“And don’t get me wrong, he certainly has his moments of doing it on his own, but we as a team need to play better.”