A woeful Penrith was demolished 30-0 by Manly at Brookvale Oval tonight.
Despite the loss of Brett Stewart and Kieran Foran prior to kick-off, Manly were superb from the outset and led 8-0 at half-time before going on with the job in the second half.
While there’s plenty of plaudits being thrown at the Sea Eagles and their halfback Daly Cherry-Evans – who was clearly Manly’s best – the Panthers certainly didn’t put up much of a fight, and have left coach Ivan Cleary with plenty of headaches heading into next weekend’s clash with Wests Tigers.
One player sure to be struggling to hold onto his spot in the team will be winger David Simmons, who had a horror night, whilst Penrith’s halves combination struggled to make an impact.
The match went through the motions in the opening 20 minutes, and Penrith had the best opportunity in the opening stanza when Michael Jennings made a break but a final pass went to ground, halting a chance to go up 6-0.
Manly finally made the crucial breakthrough in the 26th minute when Jamie Buhrer brushed off some weak Penrith defence to ensure Manly opened the scoring.
A penalty goal soon after saw the Sea Eagles go up 8-0.
Penrith needed to score first in the second half but any chance to mount pressure and get themselves back into the game was thrown away when Simmons produced a foolish off-load close to his own line in the opening minute of the second half, ultimately leading to a David Williams try.
The Sea Eagles kept piling on the points, eventually running out 30-0 winners.
Earlier, Penrith demolished Manly 44-0 in the Toyota Cup.
