Roosters coach Trent Robinson said after the game Manu was trying to emulate the try-saving tackle he came up with 10 minutes earlier on Tass.

“He was trying to knock it out and got it wrong,” Robinson said.

Roosters halfback Sam Walker told The Sun-Herald about the late flare-up: “I steered pretty far away from it. I know my limits. I’m there to play footy. But it did get heated.

“Joey Manu came up with a play to try and win the game for us. He slipped a little bit high, but we don’t want him to change his way of playing.”

Walker said his namesake Cody was frustrated, and shoved him in the back off the ball after Manu denied Tass earlier in the half.

“It was a huge play, and Cody got me off the back of that, and you could see they were getting frustrated. That’s what you want – you want them thinking about things that aren’t involved with footy,” he said.

“This is the biggest rivalry in the NRL – probably [the biggest] in Australian sport – and these are the games you want to play in. It was a packed house at Allianz, a lot of people watching on TV ... they got the better of us last year, we learnt a lot, and want to get better again this year.”

Meanwhile, the Dolphins have been rocked before the “Battle for Brisbane” with enforcer Felise Kaufusi facing a minimum three-game suspension.

Kaufusi’s uncompromising defence has inspired the undefeated Dolphins in the opening three rounds but he was pinged by the match review committee with a grade-two charge for dangerous contact on Jackson Hastings in Friday’s 36-20 win over Newcastle.

With an early guilty plea, Kaufusi will face a three-game suspension as it is his third offence – he will be sidelined for four if he fights the charge and is found guilty by the panel.

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The Dolphins face Brisbane on Friday night at Suncorp Stadium.

Asked whether the club would consider challenging the charge, Dolphins coach Wayne Bennett told AAP on Saturday they would make a call in the next 48 hours.

“We will worry about that on Monday. No decision has been made,” he said.