A brutally honest Josh Aloiai has taken ownership for Manly’s loss on Saturday night, saying “there was no excuse” for his error in golden point that allowed South Sydney to win 13-12.

Aloiai has been one of the most dominant men in the middle in the opening rounds, but his unforced error in the first set of golden point gave the Rabbitohs the territory they needed for Lachlan Ilias to slot the winner.

“I’m not going to shy away from it. It was such a critical part of the game and I’ll be the first one to own it. I really hurt us,” he said.

“We were in the position to win the game and I coughed the ball up. There’s really no excuse for it. It was a rubbish error. It really hurt us and they were good enough to get the ball back and slot the field goal.

“They’re too good a team to make that kind of error at a crucial time.”

Aloiai addressed the error on social media and was expecting to receive hundreds of messages from trolls blaming him for the loss.

But the response from fans shows the community has jumped on-board and is willing to ride the wave in 2023, with Aloiai declaring he’ll repay the faith the next time he takes the field.

“To be honest, I was expecting to jump on my social media and get absolutely slammed,” he said.

“I would have been ‘yeah that’s fine, I deserve it’, but I got so much support from the Manly community. I’m really grateful for that and I’m going to return it tenfold, I promise you that.”

Manly’s culture was questioned at the end of last season as the Pride jersey saga threatened to tear the dressing room apart, but all the chat about connectivity and camaraderie appears true after Aloiai’s teammates rallied around him.

It’s a good sign for a club that has started the year well and can consolidate its spot in the top eight when it hosts the Knights in Mudgee this weekend.

“That has to be the positive part of it,” Aloiai replied when asked about his teammates’ response.

“It was devastating obviously and I was kicking myself feeling that I’d let my teammates down, the Manly community down, my coach and the coaches, but the connectivity and support from my teammates (was incredible).

“I don’t have to walk in sad today thinking that they’re angry or that they’re off me. Even my coach checked up on me on Sunday.

“It’s one thing talking about it, but it’s another thing when adversity hits. That’s when a lot of true colours show.

“Most of my close family and close friends and my closest bonds are through adversity (because) that’s where you grow closer. I’m really positive that we’re going to get a lot closer through this. We’ll be better for it.”