Luke Metcalf and the New Zealand Warriors have left their opening round horror show in Las Vegas behind them, trouncing an ill-disciplined Manly Sea Eagles at Go Media Stadium, the visitors also lost Tom Trbojevic and Daly Cherry-Evans to second half injuries.
Despite the Warriors boasting some early possession. Manly went back to the playbook of last week and went down the right hand side. The visitors capitalised on Roger Tuivasa-Sheck jamming in to send Jason Saab away before finding Tom Trbojevic to score the opening try of the contest.
The Warriors poor discipline invited Manly down their end and after a contentious high tackle ruling against RTS, Reuben Garrick atoned for his earlier miss to pot over penalty, giving the visitors a 6-0 lead.
The Warriors attack in the red-zone had been clunky to start the game. Eventually, the Manly side had to crack and it was the much maligned halves combo of Luke Metcalf and Chanel Harris-Tavita who combined as Harris-Tavita strolled over on the Warriors left edge to level us up.
Despite Manly firing some shots, Tommy Turbo was proving to be rather ineffective with some unfamiliar mistakes that gave the Warriors some prime field position. Early ball from Metcalf left Taine Tuaupiki with some work to do on the right edge. After fooling the defence with his footwork, he then straightened and exploded through some rather disappointing Manly defence to give his side the lead.
Manly's ill-discipline was becoming the talking point. Conceding 6 set-restarts in the opening half an hour of football. A terrific short ball from Metcalf to a charging Ali Leiataua sent him across and the Warriors had a third in the opening forty to lead 18-6 at the break.
Manly started the second stanza the way they finished the first, by capitalising on some poor discipline from the home side. Following a well worked set-play, Luke Brooks delivered a peach of a pass to send Jason Saab flying down the right edge to score. There were certainly some question marks on the grounding, but the Bunker review official chose to stick with the on-field decision. Manly looked set to keep the foot on the pedal but Wayde Egan took the ball and went on the attack. A few plays later, Egan shows and goes to get the ball to the line with half an hour to go.
Just when the visitors were looking down and out, Tommy Turbo put Saab away again down the right. Saab kicked in field, Garrick somehow keeps that back in the field of play and Daly Cherry-Evans was able to ground it in the field of play. Despite several minutes of inquiry, the Bunker again chose to give the benefit of the doubt to the attacking team in another contentious ruling.
The visitors were pushing the luck with the discipline and after conceding 11 set-restarts, Adam Gee's patience finally ran out as Jake Trbojevic was sin-binned with 15 minutes to play. The home side made the visitors pay when Roger Tuivasa-Sheck crashed over through several tacklers to score and put the game beyond doubt. In the final moments, Luke Brooks' pass was intercepted by Tuaupiki, who offloaded to Leiataua who found Metcalf to race away.
Manly's woes worsened when they finished with just 12 players after injuries to Tom Trbojevic (left hamstring) and Cherry-Evans (back spasms). Despite coach Anthony Seibold being tight-lipped post-game, Manly is insistent that Trbojevic only came off as a precaution with the club deciding tomorrow if he needs a scan.