The 1996 Manly Warringah Sea Eagles season was the 50th in the club's history since their entry into the then New South Wales Rugby Football League premiership in 1947.

[1] 1st half In the 5th minute, Manly centre Craig Innes won the chase and scored after a grubber kick by his skipper Geoff Toovey.

At the 15-minute mark Saints' halfback Noel Goldthorpe conceded a penalty right in front of their goalpost after committing a head high tackle on Manly's Daniel Gartner.

Up until the 19th minute mark when Manly veteran five-eighth Cliff Lyons took the field, their coach Bob Fulton was using six running forwards with Toovey as dummy half.

From dummy-half Nik Kosef then passed the ball to Steve Menzies who stormed his way through Saints' defense of Thompson, Raper, Goldthorpe and Bartrim to score next to the posts, giving Ridge an easy conversion kick.

In the days leading up to the game, Bob Fulton had named Manly's starting forward pack to be: Owen Cunningham, Jim Serdaris, Mark Carroll, Steve Menzies, Daniel Gartner and Nik Kosef.