NRL 2021: Manly Sea Eagles beat Canterbury Bulldogs 36-18

Canterbury coach Trent Barrett has taken aim at match officials - singling out contentious calls as his side slumped to another defeat.

Here come the Sea Eagles. With hat-trick hero Tom Trbojevic returning from a cheek injury, right on cue Manly climbed into the top four for the first time this year with an unconvincing 36-18 win over the Bulldogs.

They were made to work for it at Redcliffe and won’t want to repeat their diabolical first half display, but whatever Des Hasler said at half-time did the trick.

There was fire and brimstone with Manly firebrand Josh Aloiai binned for lashing out with a boot to the face of Josh Jackson as tempers flared.

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Canterbury coach Trent Barrett also flared up over Trbojevic’s first try where he appeared to lose control of the ball and a penalty against Joe Stimson, who was put on report for pulling the hair of Marty Taupau.

Talk about perfect timing. The Sea Eagles will stay in the top four so long as they beat the Cowboys in Townsville next week and will get the vital two bites at the cherry in the finals series.

All three teams above them will be looking over their shoulders at Hasler’s team, but they must be way better than what they dished up against the Dogs.

Tom Trbojevic crosses for one of three tries (Photo by Albert Perez/Getty Images)

The fact remains that the Sea Eagles were last after four rounds and have found a way to get themselves in the premiership fight.

Daly Cherry-Evans was born just up the road at Redcliffe Hospital but the Bulldogs were not respecting any birthright and stunned a shoddy Manly to take a 12-10 lead into half-time.

Bulldogs enforcer Jack Hetherington was put on report again for a high shot on Morgan Harper but like the rest of the Canterbury pack he refused to be intimidated.

The Sea Eagles bombed try after try and were ragged in defence as Canterbury took a shock 12-4 lead when former Australian Schoolboy Matt Doorey split them down the middle and Jayden Okunbor barged over.

Try or no-try....💬 What's your call? 🤔

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Cherry-Evans took matters into his own hands and set up Haumole Olakau’atu before the break. Tom Trbojevic went in for three in the second half to get Manly home, but without him they would have struggled.

“We have got our nose in the top four now so we just want to manage that and keep working on those parts we can control. We’ve got to finish it off and get the job done next week,” Hasler said.

“It takes a season, and then we arrive at this point where are not in too bad shape.

“We recognise we were down in a few areas but we will make sure when the big games come around that we are ready to go.”

Josh Aloiai takes a hit up (Photo by Albert Perez/Getty Images)

The Dogs woes continued when Doorey suffered a suspected ACL rupture.

Barrett said “fingers crossed” it wasn’t but he was just as cross about a couple of calls.

“I thought to be in front 12-10 was a really good effort from our boys and then there was the try to Trbojevic which wasn’t a try. How they get that wrong, I just don’t know?” Barrett said.

“And it changes the game. That was a bad one. There was a few.

“Joe Stimson, his hand got tangled up in [Taupau’s] hair. He gets put on report, so they get a free interchange in the searing heat which would have worked in our favour as well and it costs us two points.

“It’s not Joe’s fault Marty’s got long hair. I watched Trent Robinson’s press conference the other day and I can see why he was so frustrated. I haven’t got that good a rant in me but those two in particular, coupled with the possession was 70 per cent against us in the second half. In that heat against a red hot team like Manly, you can’t win.”

Not good to see a significant right knee injury for Matt Doorey. Unfortunately video brings concern for an ACL/MCL injury with non-contact (to the knee itself) planting & inward collapse of the knee. Best case meniscus/bone bruise but didn’t look good. Fingers crossed for him pic.twitter.com/fTuhCnzMoF

— NRL PHYSIO (@nrlphysio) August 29, 2021

RECORD BREAKERS

Manly keep notching individual and team records.

Jason Saab, Garrick and Trbojevic are having their own internal competition for club leading try scorer. Trbojevic has 22, Saab (22) and Garrick (20). It is the first time a team will finish with three players in the same team having scored 20 or more tries in a season.

Garrick, already the highest Manly point scorer in a season, notched his 40th linebreak for the year and joined Nathan Blacklock (1999) and Preston Campbell (2001) with the most in history.

Tom Trbojevic scored three tries (Photo by Albert Perez/Getty Images)

DOGS DIG

It was a horror week off the field for the Bulldogs with Lachlan Lewis and Adam Elliott both stood down and under investigation by the NRL Integrity Unit for off-field indiscretions.

“You don’t need those distractions,” Barrett said.

“The club certainly doesn’t need any adverse publicity as well so that was disappointing, but you saw the effort from the players today. They do care a lot about their performance and they’re disappointed in the sheds again. Been a tough week.”

That didn’t stop Canterbury from rolling up their sleeves and taking it to Manly with Jackson leading his pack with grit.

The Bulldogs will claim their first wooden spoon since 2008 and another unwanted record of the first Canterbury side to lose 10 games in a row in the same season.

Tough call: Why Bulldogs must sack Elliott

— David Riccio

The Canterbury club will show us what they stand for by sacking Adam Elliott.
Anything less than terminating the repeat offender’s contract shows us that the foundations of Belmore are made of paper stilts.

As brutal as it may seem – and providing they are covered legally – the Canterbury board have no other choice.

Not if they want to live up to the culture and vision of on and off-field excellence they profess to be chasing.

“If your culture is airy fairy, then so are your results going to be,” former All Blacks coach and Bulldogs performance consultant Steve Hansen said late last year.

The tough call to sack Elliott isn’t only based on kissing NRLW footballer Millie Boyle in the bathroom of a Surfers Paradise restaurant before being ejected by security.

It’s for the snowballing brand damage the Dogs have received as a result of this player’s actions, time and time again.

This precipice that Elliott’s career sits on at the Bulldogs shouldn’t come as a great shock to the 26-year-old.

“Adam knows that (it’s his last chance),’’ Canterbury CEO Aaron Warburton said after Elliott became embroiled in an off-field tryst with former teammate Michael Lichaa’s partner.

Adam Elliott has come under fire once again, after being ejected from a restaurant on the Gold Coast.

Canterbury’s lawyers will have the final say on whether the repeated turmoil is in contradiction to Elliott’s playing contract.

No one wants to see someone lose their $450,000-a-year job.

No one enjoys watching someone with talent waste their opportunity.

It‘s fair to say the Dogs are concerned for Elliott’s welfare after another off-field indiscretion.

So the decision whether to further penalise Elliott has left some members of the Canterbury hierarchy torn.

They see a decent person who has proven he can do good by using his profile to raise awareness for autism.

But sometimes the best help you can give a person is to help change the person.

Canterbury have tried repeatedly to inflict off-field change on Elliott, specifically related to his dramas that always involve alcohol. They have wielded the big stick with him. It hasn’t worked.

He finds himself fronting the Bulldogs board for a third time in three years.

They’ve tried supporting Elliott before. They’ve tried professional help, compassion and apologies before.

He’s looked management in the eye and promised that this is it. No more. He’s repeated that line again this week.

The kiss isn’t the issue.

It’s the trust that has been broken between Elliott, his teammates and the Canterbury hierarchy.

Head coach Trent Barrett is a ‘players coach.’

Elliott could be sacked over his repeated off-field indiscretions. Picture: NRL Photos.

There will be times during his coaching tenure that this will be to his detriment.

But overall, this coaching style, he hopes, creates a bond and trust that places a ring of loyalty around his players.

In return, he only ever asks his players for honesty. Give him the truth and he will stand in front of the high-powered suits and fight for his player.

Tellingly, Barrett has hardly swung a punch on this one.

For a club and code clinging to every corporate sponsorship dollar they possibly can, another investigation by the NRL Integrity Unit does nothing for your brand.

Last Monday morning included a long line of phone calls and emails from chairman John Khoury and Warburton to major sponsors and paid-up members who have hardly watched the struggling Dogs play a live game all season.

It’s the two leaders’ task to try and explain to the million-dollar sponsors splashed on the front of the Bulldogs jersey why their company’s name is connected to negativity.

Oh and by the way, we’re still running last.

When it is time for the Bulldogs board to make their call on Elliott, in the back of the directors’ minds is that with every off-field issue that arises, the NRL is closer to whacking the club where it hurts most – by deducting competition points.

The NRL has that power, if a club repeatedly fails to clean-up their own mess. The Dogs were reminded of that this week.

Elliott swore he would seek professional help earlier this year – after the highly provocative off-field issue with Lichaa’s partner – and has told Canterbury officials it was his first alcoholic drink in seven months last Sunday night.

Not even the threat of six months in prison for getting naked in public during a Mad Monday session in 2018, or his contribution towards the NRL hitting the Dogs with a $250,000 fine and separately, $35,000 from his own bank account, was enough for Elliott to toe the line.

A member of the club’s leadership group, a reliable forward who Canterbury fought hard to retain amid interest from the Dragons and Raiders, Elliott could be saved from the axe again.

But the Bulldogs’ cultural standards won’t be taken seriously. It will be viewed by many as, airy fairy.