After coming from 0-14 down to beat the Cowboys away in round one, the Sea Eagles suffered 6 straight losses to drop to the bottom of the table. After losing 9 of the first 11 games, Manly was looking a real chance of grabbing the dreaded wooden spoon for the first time ever.

A great win over Penrith in Round 13 seemed to steady the ship. But with only six wins on the board after the record 12-72 shallacking by Penrith in round 22, the pundits were freely predicting that maroon and white would adorn the spoon.

Three wins over the last four rounds saw Manly safe from the spoon once more, with it remaining at its rightful place in Redfern.

Attack was not the problem with only five teams scoring more than Manly's 615 points. But in defence only Souths were worse than our 754 points against, or an average of 31.4 points a game!

Played: 24; won 9; lost 15; for 615; against 754; Average for 25.6; Average against 31.4; finished 13th out of 15.

Top Scorer: Andrew Walker 180 points.

Top try Scorer: Scott Donald 18 tries.