Yeah that was the unfortunate thing about the 1995 GF, we just didn't play well. We'd already beaten the Dogs 30-0 earlier in the year at Parramatta Stadium as well as finishing as minor premiers with the Dogs just scraping into 6th spot. I got the feeling on the day that we thought all we needed was to turn up and the Winfield Cup was ours.
Regardless of the forward pass try or the 7th tackle try, two teams ran onto the SFS that day and only one was mentally ready to play. I mean, we had the best attack in the 1995 ARL season with 687 points (the next best was Canberra with 634) and we didn't even score a try in the GF, our only points came from 2 Matthew Ridge penalty goals.
Unfortunately the Grand Final was our worst performance of the year.
Interestingly, when he was interviewed on the ground after our Prelim Final win over Newcastle, I remember Paul Harragon being asked who he thought would win the GF and he said the Dogs because he thought they wanted it more.
We made up for it in 1996 though. That day (the first live Manly game I saw) we made sure of it.