Lessons to be learned, says Cleary

Ivan Cleary in his early days at the Panthers. Photo: Melinda Jane
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Panthers coach Ivan Cleary says his side will learn some lessons from last night’s 30-0 drubbing at the hands of Manly.

Penrith were awful and couldn’t mount any pressure against a Manly side that didn’t play great football but still managed to put their opposition away easily.

“They really dominated the pressure stakes… I thought in the first half we had opportunities but we never really put them under pressure, I thought we let them off a bit to be honest,” Cleary said.

“They showed the template of how to win footy games tonight… they did it well.”

Cleary was disappointed with the way his side started the second half – a poor error in the first set ultimately led to a Manly try.

“That’s not first grade football,” he said.

“If you’re going to come up with the error you need to be able to defend it and we couldn’t do it. You get what you deserve a bit there.”

Cleary is waiting on news today on the fitness of hooker Kevin Kingston, who was injured in the last tackle of the match. It’s understood he hyper-extended his elbow.

There’s concerns too for captain Luke Lewis, who was injured in the second half but played on.

Cleary will name his side to play the Wests Tigers on Sunday later this afternoon.


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