The Romans at Cannae had used a collapsed manipular formation against a Punic phalanx designed to give way. Once the Romans had pushed to their deepest penetration, the wing phalanxes of the Carthaginian army turned inward and destroyed them. At Cannae, Hannibal’s master plan came to fruition. The pincer movement that failed at Trebbia worked brilliantly here. He used speed against the strength of the Roman center by offering only minimal resistance to it and then maneuvering around it until the trap was sprung.
In each of these battles we see the phalanx as a component of the Carthaginian formation but not the key. There was never a pure phalanx/maniple face-off that would prove the military superiority of one versus the other because there were other more important factors that determined the outcome.