Manly captain Daly Cherry-Evans has boldly claimed the club’s Pride jersey saga was not to blame for their shocking late-season collapse.
Having been eighth in round 18 and roaring towards finals, the club finished their campaign with seven straight losses – capped by a one-point defeat to the Bulldogs in the final round of the regular season.
Asked after the match if the jersey saga was to blame for their poor finish, Cherry-Evans firmly stated: “No, absolutely not. We couldn’t have been any clearer that we moved on from that during the season. If we were to use that as an excuse that would be pretty poor for us.”
He added: “It’s not the time for pointing fingers and blaming people. It’s about coming together, finding ways to help the club, and making sure that you’re doing the best to come back next year and for us to all play better footy.”
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Coach Des Hasler affirmed his captain’s statement, saying the controversy was ‘gone and dusted’.
“We had a real hard edge about us, we just lost momentum.
“I think we’ve got to look at it as the events that happened – they’re gone, they’re dusted. There’s a lot to be learned out of them as well.”
A rueful Hasler was disappointed at their 21-20 loss to close the season, but conceded they “probably got our just desserts.”
Hasler continued: “We started well, in control. Probably guilty of a little bit of inexperience in parts. The game was there to be had … we should have finished the game but we didn’t. It was a disappointing result in the back end of a disappointing six or seven weeks.”
He added: “Pushing aside the fact of injuries and things like that. Up to around (Rounds) 18-19-20 we were playing pretty well. As I said, there were circumstances … we’ll build again. We’ll start again.”
