A gutsy win away from home, back to a winning record on the season – is this 2023 Melbourne Storm rugby league?
South Sydney – 10 (Walker 10’, Graham 59’ tries; Mitchell 1/2 goals)
Melbourne – 18 (King 6’, Warbrick 21’, Munster 43’ tries; Meaney 3/3 goals)
If the theme of the season so far has been attitude and effort, especially in defence; Melbourne finally showed up against Souths.
From the preview:
Grant has been in great form to start the season as he now plays 80 minutes each week. His tackle numbers are sky-high, but it's not impacting his attacking play too much. His passing choices are usually spot on, especially when he trusts the playmakers to get to work. Looking for a big game from Grant this week against a representative rival.
51 tackles, one of them a brilliant try saver out wide; Harry Grant was everywhere in defence against Souths, but it was the return of his judicious running game that held the key for Melbourne building a platform to victory. He definitely had the better of his positional duel against Damien Cook.
The scoring opened in comedic fashion with Josh King crashing over for a try from a mishandled Jonah Pezet kick.1 It was certainly a nice fast start, but with both defences struggling to maintain control, Souths were able to answer soon after.2
Melbourne should have scored in the 16th minute, but for some reason decided to play some of the worst panic football seen at that venue since the 2016 Grand Final.3 Melbourne had three six again calls and didn’t settle once for a zero tackle to get their bearings. Of course it was going to end badly with Grant dropping the ball trying to score the miracle try under the posts.
Next up Will Warbrick showed what confidence can do to a winger’s game. He was solid again throughout the match defensively matched up against Alex Johnson, and did really well under the high ball. It was his strong effort to beat two defenders to score the Storm’s second try that impressed most. There’s something really nice/weird about the right side looking good with Pezet/Katoa/Smith/Warbrick finding useful connections.
During the game I tweeted this:
I stand by it. Every week he makes an impact off the bench. He won’t hit the headlines with flashy footwork, but his work rate just lifts the team nicely. He is the typical Storm role player and he does it well each week.
That there was no further tries scored in the first half can be put down to one thing – Souths’ short line dropouts. Not fielding the first one is bad luck,4 Xavier Coates having a brain explosion on the second was just bad.5
At 12–6 to start the second half, Munster somehow conspired to make a clean line break from inside the Melbourne half to get into the clear with just the fullback to beat, only to throw an errant pass away from Justin Olam in support. Fortunately just a few minutes later Coates would speed away down the left wing to deftly kick6 for Munster to score.7 The try showed how good Munster is as a support player. The effort to be in the right position has been a feature of his game since coming into first grade as a fullback, and he hasn’t lost it over the years.
With the score at 18–6, for a game that started in very loose fashion with both teams able to gain easy metres early, the second half saw just one more try, as Melbourne stoically held the line with little field territory and possession.
Souths would score with 20 minutes to go, and at 18–10 Melbourne looked vulnerable, but the attitude and effort that were missing earlier in March, were in abundance this time around. Try saving tackles were the order of the day, with multiple players putting their bodies on the line. It was great to see.8
With the ball, Melbourne probably should have put the result to bed before Souths’ second try, especially as it was the second last time Melbourne had good attacking possession in the opposition’s half until the final minutes.
In preparing this review, I noticed this graph on the Fox Sports Lab website:
It felt much closer than that in the second half.
Taking the win in this style was definitely pleasing, especially as Melbourne are very much a work in progress, with missed tackles and discipline9 still an issue that needs constant improvement.
Bellyache:10
I thought they were really brave tonight. We made it really hard on ourselves at times, but they backed that up with our best defensive game for the season without a doubt.
It’s been a while since we’ve probably seen a good as defensive effort for 80 minutes.
Was it worth it?
When my pulse hit 132bpm in the second half, alarm bells were ringing.11 Thankfully after the missed try, the desperate defence calmed me down enough to savour yet another win over Melbourne’s bunnies. The only issue is the maths of Melbourne’s win percentage against Souths only goes up from 83.78% to 84.21%, which is still about 10 percentage points higher than any other active opponent.
Rating this game higher than the round one slopfest against Parramatta, with Melbourne’s ball control better and the stakes feeling higher than in round one.12
7/10
Storm Machine Player of the Year
Harry Grant was clearly best for Melbourne, but there were a lot of good performances across the line-up.
Josh King topped the tackle stats for Melbourne with 52 tackles in 67 minutes of work, also running for 133m on 13 runs. Meaney and Munster were their usual solid (Meaney) and brilliant (Munster) with the ball, Meaney’s try saver to stop Alex Johnson a key moment late in the match.
I was going to give a point to Reimis Smith who had a great night in defence (with Will Warbrick), and with the ball in hand, but that air swing to not score a try in the second half blotted his copybook.
Round 5 points:
3 – Harry Grant
2 – Josh King
2 – Nick Meaney
2 – Cameron Munster
1 – Will Warbrick
Leaderboard
10 – Harry Grant
7 – Cameron Munster
6 – Nick Meaney
4 – Christian Welch, Josh King
2 – Eliesa Katoa, Jonah Pezet, Will Warbrick
1 – Jahrome Hughes, Alec MacDonald, Trent Loiero
Next up
Sydney Roosters – AAMI Park, Thursday 5 April, 8:00pm
This week just one thing will be on everyone’s mind:
Full preview coming hopefully in time for #SackThursdayNightFootball.
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Probably his only try for the year given his history.
I’ve seen the available replays and I still maintain the second last pass from Lachlan Ilias goes forward out of the hands. The last pass is marginal, but fine.
Okay that could be hyperbole – 2018 happened too, as did the shenanigans in 2020.
It was effort, but I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt.
“Breaking the plane” would be easier to judge if the broadcasters destroyed the parallax effect by having additional cameras on each 10m at major stadiums. Doing so would also assist with the potential for the Bunker to rule on forward passes, but this is a full length piece for another time.
Calling it a check side or banana kick doesn’t quite do it justice, plus a Steeden isn’t a Sherrin – they are different to kick.
The hit and spin offload from Tom Eisenhuth to set it up – *chef’s kiss*
The less said about #Kleined being in the Bunker the better.
7 set restarts and 6 penalties conceded is not ideal.
Putting Grant Anderson on the bench and then forgetting to use him, classic Bellsa.
Literally – I’ve always wondered how my pulse rate goes up during games, so I got the monitor out during the second half.
Apparently it wasn’t worth going if you happen to have been in The Bad Place – 11,239 is a pretty woeful attendance figure from the bandwagon fans.