Daly Cherry-Evans is closer to 36 than 35, and regularly gives away 30 kilos to the back-rowers trying to run him over.
But across a glittering 14-year, 328-game career that only seems to get better with each passing year, his most impressive number is the smallest of all.
The Manly, Queensland and incumbent Australian No.7 has missed less than 4 per cent of games he could have played through injury.
In all, Cherry-Evans has missed just 23 of the 351 NRL games since his Sea Eagles debut in 2011, with nine of those because he was away in Maroons Origin camp. Even when threatened with the first suspension of his career in April, Manly risked a three-game ban to successfully fight his charge at the judiciary.
The remaining 14 missed games over the years have been through injury, with just two of those coming after Cherry-Evans turned 31.
“Oh, I’ve had injuries though, I’ve had some this week,” the Manly skipper grins ahead of a sudden-death semi-final against the Roosters.
“I know I haven’t missed a game (this season) and it hasn’t been anything too serious obvious, but that’s not to say I don’t go without injuries.
“That’s not to say I don’t wake up some weeks thinking, ‘jeez, I wonder if I’m going to play this week’.
“I had ankle surgery in 2019 and got back quickly from that to play Origin. And there was post-season surgery at the end of 2016 on my shoulder. So I haven’t gone surgery-free.
“The timing of them has not been too bad, and the severity of them hasn’t been too bad either.
Daly Cherry-Evans and Luke Brooks celebrate their win over Canterbury.Credit: Getty Images
“I still have those weeks, those doubts and those niggles. But I do a lot of work with the medical staff here and externally I’ve got my routine.
“There’s a lot of work that goes into me playing. I know I’m not the only one in the NRL who’s doing extra routines and recovery programs … and my partner and kids understand that sometimes I have to give up a bit of time at home for an extra massage or going to a recovery place. My career isn’t going to last forever so I’m just doing everything I can to maximise it.”
Cherry-Evans has regularly laughed off suggestions of chasing down Cameron Smith’s NRL-record of 430 games given it would require another five seasons and playing into his 40s.
Smith’s durability – like Cherry-Evans, he only once played less than 19 NRL games in a season – as a fellow 80-something kilo playmaker makes him one of few that can match the Manly halfback.
Cherry-Evans can hit the open market on November 1 when his current deal – worth a little under $1 million a year – enters its final season, but a gentleman’s agreement with Manly officials to work out another deal for 2026 and/or 2027 over the summer has him at ease.
“That will get sorted at the right time, now’s just not it,” he says.
“The priority is finals and that’s where we want to be. I’ve been here so long as well that I’m not worried about the future. If it all ended tomorrow, I’d be a very happy man.
“But I know it won’t, and that’s why I’m not worried.”
Especially not when a display of game management like his second half in Manly’s comeback against Canterbury more than offsets the defensive reads that can see him targeted by opposition attacks.
Cherry-Evans expects more of the same when Luke Keary and Angus Crichton line up opposite him on Saturday night, just as he plans to send Haumole Olakau’atu right back at them.
“I’m giving up the best part of 30 kilos to some of the big boys in defence,” Cherry-Evans says. “So I’ve got to be careful and smart at times, but that comes with experience too.
“And when your number is called, you grit your teeth and do your best.”
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