KEY POINTS:
Warriors 36
Manly 14
Have the Eels lose tonight against the Dragons or next week at home to the Broncos Warriors 36 Manly 14
The Warriors are in the finals - now they want to earn a top-four spot and a home playoff.
The most pleasing aspect of their win over Manly yesterday was the way they kept their defensive line intact at the end, making repeat try-saving tackles in the last three minutes.
Another Manly try would not have mattered at that stage, but the home team were still unwilling to let themselves or the big crowd down by letting the opposition score easy points.
Manly's coach Des Hasler walked into the post-match press conference and started spitting the dummy about refereeing and video ref decisions that he said favoured the Warriors, robbed Manly of their momentum and turned the game.
Asked about the try their wing Chris Hicks scored from a blatant forward pass, he had a blunt: "Well that's the referee."
Nothing could have been further from the truth. The NRL's second-placed team were never in it, never looked like taking control of the game. It was a result that will have rocked the other sides in playoff contention.
"Clearly we didn't help ourselves, we shot ourselves in the foot a few times," Hasler said. "But I am embarrassed for Robert Finch [the NRL's referees boss]."
Video ref Chris Ward didn't understand the obstruction rule, Hasler said, blaming the official for seeing an obstruction that "wasn't there" when Sea Eagles fullback Michael Robertson got over the line eight minutes after half-time, when the score was 12-10 to the Warriors.
"No one was obstructed, no one was tackled," Hasler fumed.
"To me, that decision turned that match, it's just such a momentum killer."
His captain, Matt Orford, questioned the 10 metres kept by referee Paul Simpkins.
"It was 12 or 13 metres, it certainly opened the game up. It was a very fast, up-tempo game," Orford said.
From the start, the Warriors enjoyed the rub of the green, and their coach Ivan Cleary was happy to take it.
"There were some crucial calls, one went our way today," he said of the Robertson no-try. "We were due one."
Cleary said the club's rise "from ugly ducklings to everyone climbing all over us" may have induced a bit of stage fright.
They started with a series of errors, but the crowd of 25,070 was brought into the game in the fourth quarter as it became clear they would win.
Captain Steve Price described the lift they got from the spectators' backing as "like having an extra player on the field".
Manly would know they had played in a very intimidating atmosphere.
Cleary admitted his side hadn't played well.
"We just had to win today."
Winning ugly, winning when they were not playing at their peak was something they had yet to learn and they had gone some way towards that.
They hung on yesterday despite losing centre Jerome Ropati with a serious shoulder injury 20 minutes into the game.
Wairangi Koopu exploited a link with fullback Wade McKinnon and showed good speed to score two tries in his 150th appearance for the club.
The Eagles are likely to lose prop Jason King to suspension after he came in late to a tackle where Epalahame Lauaki was already held by two and used his forearm to Lauaki's face in a blow that KO'd the Warriors' second rower.
If the Warriors don't make the top four they face the prospect of playing their first final away in Townsville or Sydney.
* Broncos forward Brad Thorn hadn't scored a "meat pie" all year.
And after having one disallowed in the first half in the 30-19 win against Canberra on Saturday he feared he was going to go through a season without a try for the first time in 14 years.
"I wanted a try bad and I knew I only had two games left," said Thorn, one of the five Broncos veterans farewelled at Suncorp Stadium.
"When I ran across the second time [in the 66th minute] all the emotion came out and I just enjoyed the experience with the crowd."
The try, Thorn's 31st in 198 NRL games, saved him from being part of the annual "nudie run" for players who failed to get across the line during the season.
- additional reporting AAP
