Blues star Tom Trbojevic will be sent for scans on Friday after suffering a hamstring injury in the Sea Eagles’ 30-24 loss to the Dolphins on Thursday night.
Trobjevic sustained the injury in the 69th minute after colliding with a cameraman while attempting a try-saving tackle on Dolphins winger Jack Bostock. The 27-year-old limped from the field and young gun Tolutau Koula replaced him at fullback for the final minutes of the game at Suncorp Stadium.
Manly and the Blues now have a nervous wait, with Sea Eagles coach Anthony Seibold saying the severity of Trbojevic’s injury is unknown. “Not sure [the early verdict], but it’s a hamstring injury from what I understand, I’m not sure how bad it is,” he said.
It’s Trbojevic’s fifth hamstring injury in his career, after suffering one in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2023.
It was the second blow of the night for the Sea Eagles, who lost winger Jason Saab in the opening 20 minutes to a shoulder injury. “Again, he needs a scan, but they’re telling me it’s a grade three [AC joint injury] so I’m not sure exactly how many weeks that means, but we lost both those guys,” Seibold said. A grade three injury is a complete muscle tear.
Seibold said the injuries to Saab and Trbojevic would test the team’s depth and resilience with Lachlan Croker, Haumole Olakau’atu and Nathan Brown already ruled out through injury or suspension.
Oh no, not again: Tom Trbojevic leaves the field after suffering a hamstring injury.Credit: NRL Photos
The Sea Eagles had a strong start to the match, and held a 12-point lead over the Dolphins as half-time neared. But the Dolphins reeled Manly back in, with three tries in five minutes just before half-time to lead 20-16 at the break. Seibold said it was that poor defensive period that cost them the game.
“It was really disappointing that five minutes before half-time, I think that cost us the game ultimately,” he said. “I actually thought we fought really hard that second half. We lost Jason Saab early, and then we lost Turbo [Trbojevic] in the second-half, we lost our hooker Gordon Chan Kum Tong to a HIA, so a little bit all over the place.
“Five minutes before half-time was way off. They scored three tries in three consecutive sets, so that was disappointing after we played decent footy for about 30 minutes there.”
Manly skipper Daly Cherry-Evans said the team needed to fix their defensive issues ahead of Magic Round next week.
“We’re in here talking about the same trend again [losing a lead], so it’s something we need to fix, and it’s something that all of us can help each other with,” Cherry-Evans said. “We’ve got to change a few things obviously to get the result that we’re after because at the moment we’re obviously not working hard enough on a couple of things out there. We can fix it, we’ve just got to work a bit harder at it.”
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