Shock end to Lomax drama as Eels teammate\u2019s fatal snub revealed<\/a><\/p>\nBellamy: ‘Quicker than Cameron Smith!’ | 09:06<\/p>\n
FOGARTY NOT WORRIED ABOUT DCE COMPARISONS<\/p>\n
– by Martin Gabor (Newswire)<\/p>\n
Jamal Fogarty is no stranger to wearing maroon and white after his time with Burleigh in the Queensland Cup, but it\u2019s going to take a while for the Manly faithful to get used to seeing someone other than Daly Cherry-Evans wearing the No. 7 jersey.<\/p>\n
Manly\u2019s decision to sign Fogarty last May on a three-year deal came on the heels of Cherry-Evans\u2019 shock decision to announce he would leave the club at the end of the 2025 season.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s led to obvious questions about whether Fogarty can replace the man who led Manly\u2019s attack for 15 years, but he put that to bed last December.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s probably the greatest half to play for the club and put that jersey on,\u201d Fogarty said at the time.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s something I\u2019ve got to respect and acknowledge, but also I\u2019m not as talented as Daly, and I\u2019m going to be Jamal. I\u2019m not going to try and be him.\u201d <\/p>\n
The buzz around the veteran halves will kick up again when the Roosters head to Brookvale in round four, but for now, Fogarty is focused on taking on his former side the Raiders in an intriguing Saturday night showdown.<\/p>\n
Fogarty helped them claim the minor premiership last year but can\u2019t worry about that as he looks to lead his new team. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s obviously great to get it out of the way round one. I\u2019ve said before, it\u2019s good to get it out of the way because then I can crack on with my season,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously everyone in the media is going to keep asking about it, and if it was round 15 or mid-season then that would kind of be annoying. So it\u2019s kind of good to get it out of the way. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd with the banter side of things, I\u2019m not someone that sends cheeky text messages or chirps up on the field. I kind of just stick to myself and go about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sea Eagles coach Anthony Seibold says his new playmaker is more structured than what Cherry-Evans was and that he liked what he saw from him in the pre-season. <\/p>\n
\u201cAny time you come up against your former side, there\u2019s going to be media speculation around that,\u201d the coach said.<\/p>\n
\u201cJamal did a hell of a job for the Raiders over the last four years, and I\u2019m sure they\u2019ve got great memories of his impact at the club and his leadership on and off the field because we\u2019ve certainly seen it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe only gave him limited minutes in the trial, but he\u2019s been working really hard at training to build cohesion.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s probably a good thing for him to get it out of the road.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fogarty wore the Manly No. 7 jersey against the Rabbitohs in Mudgee last month and said it was good to get some minutes under his belt before the season proper.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously putting on maroon and white is different to lime green, but it was a good feeling putting it on,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cRunning out felt very different, but good to get that out of the way in the trial. And I\u2019ve just felt welcome the whole time since I\u2019ve come here. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m used to the maroon and white, my Queensland Cup team wore those colours so I\u2019m kind of used to it, just not at an NRL level. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m enjoying my time here so far, great bunch of dudes around the club that have been very welcoming. The coaching staff have been the same and all the admin people upstairs, so it\u2019s been an enjoyable move so far.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 32-year-old conceded that Manly\u2019s young halves Joey Walsh and Onitoni Large would put pressure on his spot if he didn\u2019t perform, but he won\u2019t have to worry about that if he and five-eighth Luke Brooks click from the outset.<\/p>\n
Fogarty wants to give Luke Brooks the time and space to run. Picture: Mark Nolan\/Getty ImagesSource: Getty Images<\/p>\n
He\u2019s happy to be the controlling half and let Brooks run amok on the left. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve had some great moments here at training and there\u2019s always going to be areas that we need to work on and keep improving,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut he\u2019s someone that\u2019s played over 250 NRL games, got a great running game, nice left foot kicking game, so the more that we can link up as much as possible and just keep bouncing off each other throughout the year, hopefully we can win a couple of games along the way and have a good season.\u201d<\/p>\n
BLUES TO SHAKE-UP ORIGIN PREP<\/p>\n
New South Wales will make a change to their preparations ahead this Origin series, moving their training base from the Blue Mountains.<\/p>\n
NSW have called the Blue Mountains home leading into each of the past six Origin games, but they will now change base to Magenta Shores on the state\u2019s Central Coast.<\/p>\n
Michael Maguire made the change to head to the mountains ahead of their 2024 series win.<\/p>\n
Daley returned to the helm last year for his second stint as Blues coach after Maguire\u2019s move to the Broncos and eventual premiership, but after a strong game one NSW suffered a devastating 2-1 series loss under Daley.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s something which the former Blues representative wants to turn around if he is to lead his state into the future.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne thing you know with an Origin camp, you\u2019ve got to make it a bit of fun as well, and the players these days, they certainly don\u2019t bond the way that we did when we were playing.\u201d Daley told SEN.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey bond over a lot of different things, and golf is certainly a big part of the make-up of it.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of football players, they just love getting out there. It\u2019s certainly not my thing, but some of the players \u2026 absolutely love it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Game one of the 2026 State of Origin series is at Accor Stadium in Sydney, before the series heads to Melbourne for game two, and Brisbane for game three.<\/p>\n
Eels get ‘schooner of reality’ | 00:26<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Dragons are set to face off with the NRL to discuss the officiating during their 15-14 golden…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":315339,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,2652,98721,91118,171052,2647,9499,100773,123,25484,2648,111,139,69,2659,171054,171053,94289,213,171050,1734,9997,171051,2821],"class_list":["post-315338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-blue-mountains","tag-central-coast","tag-football-players","tag-fox-league","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-laurie-daley","tag-melbourne","tag-michael-maguire","tag-new-south-wales","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-oceania","tag-series-heads","tag-series-loss","tag-series-win","tag-sports","tag-storm-pump","tag-sydney","tag-tasmania","tag-training-base","tag-victoria"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=315338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315338\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/315339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=315338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=315338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=315338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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