The Sea Eagles put together a solid showing to beat the Warriors 34-18 on Saturday night, and pick up their third win of the season in the process. Here are five key points from the Round 6 clash in Auckland.
Report: Sea Eagles upset Warriors in Auckland
Lyon boot vital
In the end Manly would still have beaten the Warriors even if skipper Jamie Lyon had missed a few kicks, but his perfect seven from seven was key to the win according to lock Jake Trbojevic.
"He kept putting them over and it makes it a lot easier when you are going up by sixes. We were up 12-6 at half-time, but if you don’t convert it’s 8-6 and then they (the Warriors) are in it," Trbojevic said.
"He is kicking really well… hopefully he can keep that going all year."
Lyon had 14 points from goals by the end of the night - 10 from conversions and four from penalties - and his accurate boot ensured Manly were ahead by multiple-score margins near the back end of the contest.
Discipline plagues Warriors
It’s hard to win NRL Telstra Premiership games when you repeatedly give your opposition easy yardage, and the Warriors admit they were guilty of that at Mt Smart Stadium.
Conceding 11 penalties doesn’t look too bad when you consider Manly gave away 10 themselves, but it was the timing and areas of the field where the indiscretions occurred that really hurt the Kiwi side.
The Warriors also coughed the ball up 10 times and finished the game having completed only 76 per cent of their sets.
"Yeah certainly [we were our own worst enemy], I thought we just gave them too much ball, too many errors and too many penalties coming out of their own end," captain Ryan Hoffman said.
"We just put ourselves under too much pressure."
Extra rest a big help according to Manly
The Sea Eagles have made their thoughts on five-day turnarounds abundantly clear this season, and after the win in Auckland Trbojevic was quick to credit their extended rest time in the build-up.
After playing on Thursday night in Round 5 Manly enjoyed a nine-day gap between games.
"Yeah I think it did [make a difference], when you have the five-day turnarounds you don't have much time to prepare, its more about recovery," Trbojevic said.
"I think it did help a lot."
Manly the Warriors’ undisputed bogey team
The win marked four-straight victories for the Sea Eagles over the Warriors, which is impressive in itself.
But a look at the overall head-to-head record between the two shows triumphs over the Kiwi side are an absolute habit for Manly.
Since the Warriors came into the competition in 1995 Manly have lost against them just eight times in 28 meetings, and have now won 17 of their last 21 against them.
Post-match Barrett laughed the record off, playing it down as a coincidence.
"I read it this morning somewhere, but I wasn't aware of it and that sort of stuff doesn't really mean too much to me or the players," he said.
While Lyon attempted to explain some of the possible reasons behind it.
"I don’t know what it is, we have had a good run over here of late," Lyon said.
"I guess we always get up for them because we always know they (the Warriors) are going to come out strong."
No looking back after good start
Manly came flying out of the gates and had the better of the Warriors for all but the final two minutes of the first half.
By the 25-minute mark they were 12-0 up and had already sucked some of the life out of the Warriors and the crowd of 16,112 in Auckland.
"We started well and our defence was really good, particularly in that first half, I thought we just showed a lot of intent in everything we did," Barrett said.
"Our aim was to start well and I guess we built our way into the game."