The Wests Tigers are out to maintain the rage from their opening round win against the Warriors, while the Manly Sea Eagles want to open their account for 2016. Join The Roar for live scores and commentary from 6:45pm (AEDT).
The Tigers blitzed the Warriors in the first half at home last week to seal their first win of the season.
Wests were soft in the second half though, giving the Warriors a sniff. If Manly receive the same invitation they will capitalise.
Meanwhile Manly looked every bit a new outfit as they suffered a clunky loss to the Bulldogs at Brookvale Oval. That said, the Dogs look hard to beat in 2016.
If Manly can get off to a good start and post early points, they will be much harder to topple than the Warriors.
The Tigers welcome back Luke Brooks and Dene Halatau, while the Sea Eagles have Brenton Lawrence and Josh Starling coming into the side for Blake Leary and Darcy Lussick.
The Sea Eagles hold the wood over the Tigers in the head-to-head stakes, winning on 14 occasions to the Tigers’ eight. And while Manly have just a 25 per cent win rate at Leichardt, they won the only clash between the two last year by a ten-point margin.
Prediction
Sea Eagles by 7.
Join The Roar for live blog and commentary from 6:45pm (AEDT), and be sure to add your thoughts below throughout the game.
Worlds Biggest
Guest
Good win Tigers buts it's very early days to be crowning premiers and wooden spooners in equal measure. Remember the Knights lead the Comp after 4 or 5 rounds last year. I think you have to wait until Rd 8 or 9 to get a gage on where a team is at. Manly will take a bit of time to gel with all the new players. I don't think D Walker is a 5/8, no kicking game at all. The Tigers have looked slick in the first two rounds. As always injuries will determine if they're top 8 material or not.
Joe
Roar Rookie
I don't think I've seen Lewis Brown play a worse game. He was pretty bad out there. Lawrence and Taupau were Manly's best and Jake Trbojevic was pretty good too. Backs were pretty ordinary.
SpongeBob
Guest
Must be tough being a Tigers supporter! When they've got the ball they generally look so good. Unfortunately the other team also get to have the ball, and then the Tigers look really bad. I thought Manly would win tonight but their defence was ordinary, Tigers kept playing out the back and Manly were constantly short. Lyon as you mentioned was out of position a number of times, not that any one player was to blame. Still, 2 games 2 wins is a good start, if they can tighten their defence they should go alright this year. I'm interested in seeing how DCE / Foran go, been a lot of debate about who's the better player. Rd2 was Foran by a knockout.
Joe
Roar Rookie
I've revised my opinion of the Tigers, they are a real threat this year. The forwards get the job done and backs are outstanding with Tedesco and out and out superstar. Manly tried hard but they were no chance. They were made to look pretty pedestrian except for the ex Tiger Taupau who was awesome with his power runs. Lyon is starting to look very ordinary and maybe the years have caught up with him...Matai at least has some big hits left in him. I doubted the Tigers could do as much damage against the Manly backs but they did it with ease. If not for the high penalty count Manly would have been dead and buried in the first half.
eagleJack
Roar Guru
Inglis has been good, but I'm not sure he's the form NSW 1
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Guest
Yeah - Tedesco and Dugan in the centres and Michael Jennings to full back should do it.
SpongeBob
Guest
Bit of a jibe :) Can be risky playing good attack but weaker defence players in Origin
JB
Guest
Inglis has done that to better players than tedesco, he's the form NSW 1 after 2 rounds not that that is much to judge from.
E-Meter
Guest
Lewis Brown wins the award for best error machine. He was hopeless.
SpongeBob
Guest
Once he was pulled back down would have been a tricky penalty to call. Hard to argue the defender should have gotten up quicker given the attacker pulled him back down. Quite negative stuff, if he just fought to play it quickly would have been a better outcome (maybe. Couldn't confidently call that after the play they chose afterwards. But it should have been!)
Jack Aubrey
Roar Guru
FULLTIME Tigers - 36 Sea-Eagles - 22 If the Tigers find a bit more discipline, control and killer instinct they could be very hard to beat in 2016. They have let the Warriors and Sea-Eagles in but have also blown them both away and cut away the lull's in concentration and they are a force no doubt about it. They just have the speed and skill in the backline that is vintage Tigers, they are playing a great attacking brand of football. The Sea-Eagles look lost, they got back into the game with some good solo tries but look lacking of attitude in defence and direction in attack. Foran is such a big loss for them in spite of all their aquistions, he brought toughness, attitude and control. The Sea-Eagles explode out of the blocks, scoring immediately after halftime to lock up a game that was 16-2 to the Tigers. The Tigers though were just given too many opportunities, running riot. The Sea-Eagles inexplicably butchered a last tackle play with the game on the line in the last 5. They were also perhaps robbed of one with a poor knock-on call from the officials, but the best team won on the night. The Tigers head to the off to the Gold Coast next weekend, the Sea-Eagles meanwhile face an ominous Sharks side at home, on Monday night. ROAR MVP POINTS: 3) James Tedesco. MUST be in Laurie Daley's mind for the future. Scored 3, set up another, 3 line-breaks, always safe at the back, always present in attack, often involved in back to back plays on opposite sides. 2) Martin Tapau. A shining light for the Sea-Eagles. Scored a try. Set up another with one of his 3 line-breaks. Made 33 tackles and ran for over 160m. Great attitude too. 1) Mitchell Moses. Impressed with his growth as a player so far this season. 3 assists for him. Still missing tackles though which is a worry, with Walker beating him to score. Will hopefully improve this part of his game. An intriguing game of football that maintains the status quo for both sides. Looking forward to doing it all again from Shark Park next week.
SpongeBob
Guest
I can think of one reason why they'd be worried about him at Origin fullback.
eagleJack
Roar Guru
Agreed mate. It's the setting up of others that Dugan simply doesn't have in his game
Joel Erickson
Roar Guru
I did see it Spongebob. It looked an obvious professional foul to me. Tedesco could have tried a lot harder to get off the tackle.
SpongeBob
Guest
May make the highlights reel, else if you can watch it again via digital pass or foxtel. I can only imagine he was trying to get a Tigers player in the bin. Given he was on his back though the only way was to pull a player back down on him, hard to sell it from that position. Between that, DCE's 5th tackle option they made an absolute meal of it. Should have been a try. I can only gather from when I quickly rewound is that in the hype of making a break they didn't pay attention to the ref. It was pretty clear, no-one was really arguing for six again or any reason why it wouldn't have still been the last. But still, even if that was the first, a settler after you made a huge break and the defence is in tatters? Gus says no no no no no.
Renegade
Roar Guru
If somebody says Dugan is a better choice for nsw fullback than tedesco.... They deserve a paddlin'!
eagleJack
Roar Guru
Surely he is far and away in front of those 2. Fingers crossed no injuries for him. Great ball player too, no just sheer speed
Muzz
Guest
NSW should play him in the centres. This will strengthen 3.2 positions.
Joel Erickson
Roar Guru
Also, completely agree about DCE blowing a try. Picking the wrong side is bad, but losing track of the tackle count is worse. Must have been thinking about what to splash his pay check on.
Muzz
Guest
What's Tedesco worth on the open market? 900k a year or thereabouts?