St George Illawarra coach Shane Flanagan will put aside his friendship with Manly counterpart Anthony Seibold for at least 80 minutes on Saturday as the Dragons look to end their two-game losing run with victory over the Sea Eagles at WIN Stadium.
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Flanagan was an assistant coach at Manly last season where he enjoyed a good working relationship with Seibold.
The respective coaches are also firm friends but Flanagan told the Mercury on Friday there would be no talk about friends for a Dragons outfit desperate to return to the winners circle after successive big losses to the Dolphins and North Queensland Cowboys.
"We've got a really big job tomorrow. I'm not talking about friends tomorrow, we just got to get two competition points and I'll do anything to get them," Flanagan said.
The Sea Eagles head to Wollongong with a 2-1 win/loss record after a tough last-start loss to Parramatta,but in all three games showed plenty in attack.
This has not surprised Flanagan, who worked as one of Manly's attack coaches under Seibold last year.
"They've always been a quality team. With all their players fit at the moment, they're probably at full strength, and it's showing [in their results].
"[Luke Brooks] has made a difference, he's a class player.
"Last year they had a few different halves partner with Daly Cherry-Evans. They had [Cooper] Johns there at one point, then they had young Jake Arthur, so they had a few different halves play with Cherry-Evans.
"At least now they've got a good halves combination there and they complement each other.
"But it's not about Manly, it's about the Dragons.
"I know [Manly's] strengths and I know a few of their weaknesses, but it's very hard to input all that information into a playing group, we just got to go out and do what we do best.
"We can't let ourselves worry too much about the strengths of Manly, they are a a really good football team but we will just concentrate on ourselves on the weekend."
Like the Sea Eagles, St George Illawarra have also looked good in attack at times, with their coach happy with how the Dragons halves Ben Hunt and Kyle Flanagan have led the team around the park.
"That's one piece of the puzzle that has worked out really well," Flanagan said.
"Their combination, their communication and getting the team around the park has been really good. We can score points and that's down to the halves."
But the coach wanted his team to be more desperate in defence and play like the Dragons did in their opening round win over the Gold Coast Titans.
"We need to play like we did in the first game," Flanagan said.
"We need to save tries and defend well. All good sides are based on defence.
"We showed in the first round we could do that and on the back of that score points but in the last two games we haven't defended well and if you don't defend well, you don't win football games."
The Dragons have been boosted by the return of Francis Molo (suspension), Jacob Liddle (concussion), Jaydn Su'A (quadriceps) and Hame Sele (hamstring) for the clash against the Sea Eagles.
Sele has been named on the interchange for his first game as a Dragon in 2095 days.
A Kingsgrove Colts junior, Sele made his NRL debut for the Dragons in Round 6, 2017 against the Sea Eagles and linked back up with the club this season.
The Dragons play Manly at WIN Stadium on Saturday from 5.30pm.
Agron Latifi
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
