“While Chez is at the club I’ve got his back,” Seibold said, having sat uncomfortably alongside his captain for six minutes of questioning about the week and alleged smear campaign that was.
“He knows that. I’ve had conversations with Chez with regards to that. I know it makes him uncomfortable with regards to a lot of the questioning but the biggest thing we can do is continue to play good footy … I’m not worried about 2026. I’m worried about now.
“And I’m worried about next week. It’s business as usual for me. My job’s to prepare the team and that’s what I’ve done.”
Fair enough too, considering the job at hand is hosting premiership favourites Melbourne next Sunday without talismanic fullback Tom Trbojevic.
The only thing needed less than Trbojevic going down for a month right now with a gammy knee is another week of damaging stories from both sides of the Cherry-Evans saga.
As it stands, Manly hierarchy and Cherry-Evans’ camp are both saying they’ll stay quiet if the other side does.
But attempts to defuse the saga might well go the same way as the Manly staffer who jumped into Sunday’s incendiary press conference to ask Cherry-Evans about playing in front of a sell-out home crowd.
The next question pivoted straight back to whether he feared being booed by the sell-out home crowd that overwhelmingly threw their support behind him, which is how Manly’s entire 2025 season will be played out and recalled in years to come.
The story of a club’s longest-serving player, a decorated captain playing as well as ever, yet announcing his exit from the club amid endless finger pointing around contract lengths and values - it’s just too big.
Manly’s last title from 2011, with Cherry-Evans as a world-beating 22-year-old rookie, is still best remembered for Des Hasler’s stunning exit a week after the grand final.
A siege mentality, Manly against the world - not least the faction-riven club board who Hasler fell out with - played more than a small part in that premiership.
Seibold is a different cat to Hasler, despite both being gravelly-toned teachers who have made careers out of coaching.
He has weathered rugby league at its most vicious before though. Seibold carries the scars and hard-learned lessons of a toxic tenure at Brisbane that ended in a wooden spoon. He was ostracised by the club’s influential former players and a slew of vile, unfounded social media rumours.
Having arrived at Manly in the wake of Hasler’s second ugly demise and the Pride jersey debacle, a united club has been Seibold’s remit right through to this campaign - easily their most promising since 2021.
‘The Manly way’ has been a theme, and the title of two behind-the-scenes documentaries about their past two off-seasons.
For whatever reason at a proud, successful club, history shows the Manly way has often included ending on the worst possible terms with their favourite sons, before eventually mending relationships. And maybe if there’s time, torching them again.
Bob Fulton, Immortal and the single greatest figure ever at Manly, made a show-stopping move to the Roosters to end his career. He eventually returned for a storied coaching and administrative career on the Northern Beaches, but the Fulton family has since split from the club for good.
Paul Vautin’s own move to the Roosters - after being offered a drastically reduced contract in 1989 - is regarded as one of the game’s messier club exits.
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Both of Hasler’s coaching stints have ended with lawyers at 20 paces. Geoff Toovey was unceremoniously sacked as coach in 2015.
His role in letting Glenn Stewart leave a year earlier, a move that rattled Manly players at the time, was later cited by owner Scott Penn as playing a part in Toovey’s own demise.
Seibold’s great coaching challenge might not come this Sunday against the premiership favourites without arguably the most influential fullback in the game.
In an NRL season, ups and downs are inevitable.
Even if the Cherry-Evans saga simmers down, any losing run is when it will boil right back up, along with questions on where the players, staff and club all truly stand.
Right in the middle, charged with keeping the peace, will be coach Seibold.
Michael Chammas and Andrew “Joey” Johns dissect the upcoming NRL round, plus the latest footy news, results and analysis. Sign up for the Sin Bin newsletter.
