Sourcing caveat: The 1978 premiership required two matches: the Grand Final proper on Saturday 16 September 1978 (Manly-Warringah 11-11 Cronulla-Sutherland; attendance 51,510) and the replay on Tuesday 19 September 1978 (Manly-Warringah 16-0; attendance 33,552), brought forward to midweek because of the departing Kangaroo tour. The date, score and attendance fields on this page refer to the replay, which decided the premiership.
Tries: Graham Eadie — minute unconfirmed; Russell Gartner — minute unconfirmed; Russell Gartner — minute unconfirmed Goals: Graham Eadie (3/8) Drop goals: Graham Eadie (1, 2nd half)
The Clive Churchill Medal was first awarded in 1986; no official best-on-ground medal existed for this Grand Final.
Match context
For the second consecutive season the Grand Final could not be decided in one afternoon. On Saturday 16 September 1978, Manly-Warringah and Cronulla-Sutherland played out an 11-11 draw at the Sydney Cricket Ground before 51,510 fans, with the polarising Greg Hartley, the referee at the centre of that year's fierce finals controversies, in charge. Winger Tom Mooney scored Manly's only try and fullback Graham Eadie kicked four goals, while Cronulla answered through a try to winger Steve Edmonds and four goals from star centre Steve Rogers, whose late penalty goal levelled the scores; in the dying moments Rogers' attempt at a match-winning field goal drifted wide. Because the Kangaroos were due to fly out for the 1978 tour of England that weekend, the replay could not wait until the following Saturday and was instead scheduled just three days later, on Tuesday night, 19 September, the second Grand Final replay in premiership history after 1977. Before a reduced midweek crowd of 33,552, an unchanged Manly side overwhelmed a Cronulla outfit forced into four changes by injury, winning 16-0 in the club's sixth game in twenty-four days. Eadie was a one-man wrecking crew, tearing the Sharks apart with blind-side bursts in a dominant first-half display: he scored a try, kicked three goals and added a field goal, a Grand Final scoring treble that has never been matched, and was universally acclaimed man of the match, an honour later formalised when the League retrospectively named best-afield winners for pre-1986 deciders. Centre Russell Gartner, playing on a damaged hamstring carried from the preliminary final, somehow crossed for two tries, with Eadie scoring the other as Cronulla were held scoreless. The triumph was Manly's fourth premiership of the 1970s, following 1972, 1973 and 1976, confirming the Sea Eagles as the dominant club of the decade and a ruthless finals machine under the most punishing of schedules. For Cronulla, contesting just their second Grand Final in twelve seasons of existence, both lost to Manly after the brutal 10-7 defeat of 1973, the replay extended a premiership drought that would become one of the game's longest-running storylines.
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