The two sides of Sydney Roosters hardman Jared Waerea-Hargreaves Roosters' Jared Waerea-Hargreaves is giving his marching orders by referee Matt Cecchin. NOEL Cleal, the Manly legend who signed Jared Waerea-Hargreaves, says the Roosters enforcer possesses the Jekyll-and-Hyde style of former Sea Eagles hitman Les Boyd. Ahead of Sunday night's decider at ANZ Stadium, Cleal yesterday lamented Manly's loss of a front-rower he regards among the most intimidating forwards of the past 40 years. Now the recruitment chief at Canterbury, Cleal believes Waerea-Hargreaves has the presence of premiership-winning Test bookends Glenn Lazarus and Steve Roach. But from day one, the quality that most impressed Cleal was Waerea-Hargreaves" unrivalled aggression, the type of raw intensity that made Boyd one of the code's most polarising figures. Cleal was a teammate of Boyd's at Manly when the forward firebrand was suspended for 12 months for breaking Daryl's Brohman's jaw in the 1983 State of Origin series. Upon returning from his ban, Boyd was then rubbed out for 15 months for eye-gouging Canterbury's Billy Johnstone - ending his career in Australia and forcing him to English club Warrington. While Waerea-Hargreaves' judiciary record is far less infamous, Cleal says the Roosters firebrand has Boyd's rare fusion of off-field gentility and on-field hostility. "With Les Boyd you wouldn't get a nicer fella off the field, but on the park he was a raving lunatic," recalls Cleal, who lured Waerea-Hargreaves to Manly from rugby union in 2008. That's the beauty of Jared . . . what he does on the field doesn't relate to him off the field. On the field, he has this aggressive all-out attitude but off it he is a gentle-natured bloke. You look back over the ages and he's pretty special. You look at someone like Les (Boyd) or John O'Neill (Souths and Manly enforcer) in the mid-1970s, Jared is of that ilk, just charging on to it and knocking blokes over. He also reminds me of a Glenn Lazarus or Steve Roach, they were two blokes who were hard to tackle and loved the collision. As long as he stays fit, Jared will become one of New Zealand's great props. Front-rowers get better with age, they don't play their best footy until 27 and Jared is three years away from that. There is still more to come from him and that's a scary thing. Like Boyd, the 121kg front-rower is no stranger to the judiciary. He has been charged five times, missing a total of eight weeks, including a five-match ban after being sent off for a high shot on Manly rival George Rose in May. Waerea-Hargreaves played just one season of NRL at Manly before joining the Roosters, but Cleal defended claims the Sea Eagles didn't fight hard enough to keep him. "We fought tooth and nail to keep Jared but it came down to dollars," he said. We were trying to retain a premiership-winning side and the sad part is the fact Manly weren't able to hang onto him. On toughness alone, I knew Jared would make it. We signed him from rugby for a pretty basic deal, he got no more than a lower-tier deal of around $40,000. His toughness stood out straight away. He liked the collision, he loved the tough part of it and probably wasn't getting that physicality in rugby union for 80 minutes. He had a bit of work to do on his skills, but Des Hasler (former Manly coach) spent a lot of time on him and deserves credit for developing Jared into what he is today.