By MARK CASHMAN

It was a day of milestone at Coogee Oval as Randwick continued their climb up the Shute Shield ladder with a vital 34-15 win over Manly on Saturday.

The club celebrated their celebrated links to the Indigenous community by playing in a special jersey and also had a number of formalities before the game, a welcome to country, smoking ceremony and the national anthem sung in one of the First Nations tongues.

But once the game kicked off it was all about honouring the likes of David Vea for his 100th grade game, Dave Horwitz’s 50th first grade cap and of course the very last game on Coogee Oval for the evergreen hooker Adam Freier.

Randwick coach Ben McCormack said it wasn’t a pretty affair but his side got out of it what they needed to.

“It was a bit of a stop-start affair, but we just did what we had to,” McCormack said.

“They all did themselves proud in a great day for the club clean sweeping Manly in all the grades and the colts.

“David (Vea) was probably the stand out from all those guys putting on some great shots in defence and hitting 100 percent of his line outs on what was a very windy afternoon.

“Michael McDonald at scrum half was excellent in his starting debut and Tom Piroddi put in a good shift with an awesome work rate and some quality touches.”

The game didn’t start well for the home side though with Manly getting off to a bit of flyer with a try prop Sio Tatola and a penalty goal to Harley Attwater for an 8-0 lead.

The home side then got themselves into the game with a penalty goal to Ben Donaldson and a try to Triston Reilly who wore a special pair of boots with artwork done by his uncle.

The Reilly try seemed to flick the switch for Randwick and they followed that up with five pointers from McDonald, Kyle Harris and Brooklyn Hardaker before Manly hit back with one from their flyers Yool Yool.

Randwick replacement Kristian Jensen finished off the afternoon with another try that was duly converted by Donaldson for the final scoreline.

Manly coach Matt McGoldrick admitted that the Wicks were just that little bit slicker.

“But it was an improved showing from us. Our set piece was very good again while Yool Yool and Hunter Ward were outstanding,” McGoldrick said.

“I was actually pretty happy with the application that we showed throughout the game.

“We just made some errors at bad times, but it was a step forward for us.”

RANDWICK 34 (Michael McDonald, Brooklyn Hardaker, Triston Reilly, Kyle Harris, Kristian Jensen tries; Ben Donaldson 3 conversions, pen goal) d MANLY 15 (Alefosio Tatola, Yool Yool tries; BJ Hartmann conversion, Harley Attwater pen goal) at Coogee Oval.

IMAGE: ADAM MCDONALD / MANLY MARLINS