Thanks for the input, Captain.
On approach at 25ft RA the AFDS sends a flare retard signal to the AT and causes the AT servo to drive the throttles to the aft stops (interestingly this happens during a MANUAL or AUTO landing). SPD will be replaced by IDLE on the FMA.
It is
interesting. None of my books says anything about how the A/T will behave during a manual landing. During a manual landing, as you know, you are not going to see the FLARE at 50' or the ROLLOUT at 5' on the FMA. If there's no FLARE and no ROLLOUT then I think it would be a stretch to imply that it would "seem obvious" that the AFDS would be sending a flare retard signal to the A/T servo to drive the A/T to IDLE. Nevertheless, this must be taking place behind the scene, even in the absence of the FLARE and ROLLOUT commands.
If you have any material on this and it's not too much of a burden, please PM me with it. Thanks again!