After 15 years in the NRL, did we ever get to know the real Daly Cherry-Evans?

Before he surpassed Cliff Lyons as the most capped Sea Eagle of them all, Daly Cherry-Evans said he felt his time as an NRL pariah was over.

“Our game loves heroes and villains,” Cherry-Evans told this masthead last year. “I’ve done my time as a villain in the game.”

Perhaps he spoke too soon.

Cherry-Evans will celebrate another momentous occasion, his 350th NRL appearance, in Saturday’s clash against the Dolphins. The veteran halfback will mark one of his last appearances at Brookvale Oval before, many predict, moving to finish his stellar career at Bondi Junction.

Talk of the Roosters, or whatever else might happen at the end of the season, was off limits when “DCE” fronted the media on Wednesday.

“I’ll just start off by saying hopefully we can stay away from the future stuff,” was Cherry-Evans’ opening gambit. “I’m not going to answer anything.

“I understand you might ask, but I’m just not going to answer anything. I want to try and keep the focus on this weekend and Manly and hopefully the celebration of this weekend. So I hope you can understand that.”

How he will be remembered by the Sea Eagles faithful remains a mystery. One of the club’s greatest-ever players, Cherry-Evans never enjoyed the affection afforded the aforementioned Lyons, the rascal who would sneak in a cigarette before mesmerising opposition defences.

Cherry-Evans’ crime? Having the audacity to potentially finish his career somewhere other than the Northern Beaches. Paul Vautin somehow managed to finish up at the Roosters without becoming less of a Manly man, but another standard is seemingly applied to Cherry-Evans.

Perhaps it’s because fans could relate to Fatty, Cliffy, Bozo, Beaver, Wombat or Toovs. But, after 15 years in first grade, did we ever truly get to know Daly Cherry-Evans?

“By nature I am very, very private,” Cherry-Evans said. “I think over the later part of my career I’ve tried to give the media and journalists a bit more of an insight, only because I believe that you guys are the link between us and the fans.

“So I think for the fans’ sake I’ve tried to show them a bit more.

“Have I really showed my true colours through the media? Probably not.

“But I guess there’s also a part of me that really enjoys when I’m at the pub and someone comes up to me and we have a chat and then they go ‘Geez, you’re not what I thought you were.’ I sort of like that a little bit.”

His move to the Tricolours has been reported as a done deal, but that’s not the case, at least in a contractual sense. Sources speaking on the condition of anonymity have told this masthead that no deal has been agreed, not even of the handshake variety. Yet the transfer is still expected to happen, raising the prospect that he could join Cameron Smith as the only players to break the magical 400-game barrier.

“At the moment it does seem like it’s so far away, but I think deep down I had the same feeling at 300,” Cherry-Evans said. “I thought, ‘That looks so far away’, but before you know it, you keep persisting, and you’re here again.

“I’ll never say never on those things, but the reality is I actually just don’t know how long I’m going to keep playing for.

“It would be crazy for me to think any more than just year to year. If I was to get there, a lot of things would have to go right, but it’s pretty ambitious, isn’t it?

“I think for right now I’m just going to enjoy 350 and see where that takes me.”

This isn’t the biggest contractual drama Cherry-Evans has endured. A decade ago, he committed to the Titans but, as permitted under the rules at the time, backflipped when Manly came back with a better offer. It was dubbed a “lifetime deal”, one that couldn’t have predicted recent events.

Does he have regrets about the nature of his departure?

“I think I’ve been through bigger decisions than this one,” he said to the Gold Coast situation. “I thought the one earlier in my career was a bigger one and I’ve got no regrets for that one. So I reckon I’ll have no regrets for this one.”

The Sea Eagles may not like his decision, but it was made early enough for the club to plan for the future. Cherry-Evans’ departure, along with Lachlan Galvin’s mid-season exit from Wests Tigers, have been the biggest rugby league stories of the year. It’s possible the transfers will end well for all four clubs involved. The Bulldogs-Galvin combination will be better after a pre-season together, while the Tigers have won four of their past six games since the youngster left the club.

Manly have the arrival of Canberra’s Jamal Fogarty and the emergence of young guns Joe Walsh and Onitoni Large to look forward to, while the Roosters hope Cherry-Evans can have a Cooper Cronk-like impact. The Tricolours signed Cronk at the end of 2017 for the final two years of his career, which both ended in Roosters premierships.

With only three games to go in the maroon jersey, the focus will turn to Cherry-Evans’ legacy on the northern beaches.

“The piece on how you get remembered, I think at the end of the day all you want to be known for is a reliable teammate that could do his job and be counted on,” he said.

“I think that’s the main thing you want to walk away with when it comes to how you want to be remembered.

“The thing I’m going to take away is the connections, the friendships, the relationships … To be able to go away, I’ll retire and be old and hopefully one day I can bring my grandkids here and sort of point to something on the wall and say I was a part of this one day.”

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