Two tries to star recruit Jamie Lyon helped Manly to a 32-6 NRL trouncing of Canberra at Brookvale Oval, but the Sea Eagles are counting the cost of a crushing injury toll.

Lyon returned to the NRL for the first time since 2004 and was on the spot to touch down after kicks by Orford in the 32nd minute and replacement half Travis Burns in the 60th.

He also booted three conversions in the Sea Eagles' six try to one romp.

But Steve Menzies (abdominal), Matt Orford (knee) and Steve Matai (ankle) all picked up injuries, while former NSW State of Origin forward Anthony Watmough was ruled out before kick-off with an abductor muscle strain.

Former Parramatta star Lyon, who played most of the match in the centres after Matai limped off in the 12th minute, was happy to bag the four-pointers but wasn't raving about his early-season form.

"That's the only positive I got out of tonight really besides the two points, for an individual game I was very scrappy," Lyon said.

Winger Michael Robertson, lock Luke Williamson, centre Steve Bell and prop Jason King also grabbed four-pointers for the home side, who lit up Brookvale despite the ground's eastern side floodlights twice failing during the second half.

Five of the Sea Eagles tries came from kicks, while Canberra's only try came from fullback Marshall Chalk four minutes after the break.

The first light failure came moments after Chalk's try and caused a delay of around five minutes.

The second came 10 minutes into the second half, but both captains agreed to play on.

"We were happy to come back on ... (or) we'd be here all night," Raiders captain Alan Tongue said.

Down 14-0 at halftime, Canberra had scored first in the second half through Chalk and while coach Neil Henry offered no excuses for his side's atrocious ball control after that, he did say the problem with the lights had affected them.

"We lost a bit of momentum there, we got the try there then there was a six or seven minute delay with the lights so that didn't help us," he said.

"We're obviously back to square one ... we need to be able to control the ball, that's a key factor in the game."

Manly coach Des Hasler praised his forwards' gutsy display in the face of the injuries and offered a wry observation on the light failure.

"Those sort of things are out of the club's control ... maybe it's an election issue," he said.

Despite the much vaunted new Manly halves combination of Lyon and Orford ending up with little time together, the pair had still managed to come up with their first misunderstanding in spectacular style when the five-eighth dropped a pass cold from his skipper's penalty tap in just the seventh minute.

But, after Robertson had crossed in the 14th minute and Williamson in the 27th, they clicked for Lyon's first try when Orford sent a pinpoint grubber into the in-goal in the for the star recruit to pounce.

The former St Helens pivot's second try also came from a kick, replacement half Burns sending up a high cross-field bomb which Raiders winger Colin Best fumbled and Lyon was on the spot to touch down.

Bell scored a classy solo effort in the 66th minute and Orford cleverly reverse kicked for King's four-pointer in the 71st.

Canberra replacement Neville Costigan was placed on report for lifting Sea Eagles hooker Michael Monaghan.

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