I’m not mad or disappointed by Melbourne this week, more frustrated. That top four spot is hanging by a thread.
Penrith – 26 (To’o 24', 51', Luai 28', Crichton 38' tries; Cleary 5/6 goals)
Melbourne – 6 (Tonumaipea 6' try; Meaney 1/2 goals)
Not much to talk about from the highlights this week.
I do not like him with the whistle
When he has it, it makes me bristle
I do not like him as the ref
It makes me feel quite bereft
I do not like Adam Gee
On this all Storm fans can agree1
I could almost repeat everything I wrote about Adam Gee from the last time these teams played at Marvel Stadium. That’s now six straight losses for Melbourne in matches where he has the whistle.
From the first set his narrative refereeing was in action. Melbourne stood no chance against him, let alone a dominant home team.
Missing Jahrome
When the Melbourne team sheet had both Jahrome Hughes and Xavier Coates missing, this game was as good as lost for Melbourne. This year’s Melbourne Storm has become very right edge orientated in attack, which has the added benefit of negating the left side attack of most opposition teams. Without Hughes to move the ball right in combination with Nick Meaney, Melbourne’s attack needed to refocus on Cameron Munster’s ability to float from the left edge to the middle and right edges. For whatever reason, that didn’t play out in this one. Too much was left to Jonah Pezet, and with a very skinny 10m enforced against the Prefects, there was little space for him to work through.
Indeed this is where Penrith keep beating Melbourne. Harry Grant and Munster lose that little bit of space afforded by competent officials who dare to penalise teams by setting a standard early and enforcing it.
The first 20 minutes…
From the moment Gee awarded Penrith an extremely soft penalty to open the scoring in the 10th minute, this was going to be the pattern of the match. That Melbourne levelled the scores moments later from a gimme offside penalty was by-the-by.
When Young Tonumaipea made a break down Melbourne’s left a couple of sets later, things looked on the up for the Storm. Tonumaipea (and Trent Loiero) making the most of an out of position Zac Hosking to get through the defensive line and grubber ahead for George Jennings to regather. Jennings had the right presence of mind to wait for the next play, rather than push for a miracle. Tonumaipea’s effort to get to the ruck and take the next carry to score was perfect work from the Victorian centre. At 6–2 it looked okay for Melbourne, despite having just one tackle inside the Panthers half of the field.
But there was a problem. Jennings was hurt in the effort to regather, leaving the field with what looks like a season-ending knee injury. Poor George. He really can’t take a trick.
After that point though despite Melbourne holding their own, especially in the middle, the potent Panthers attacking outfit went to work thanks to another couple of dodgy penalties from Gee.
Then this happened:
We are all Ryan Hinchcliffe. “Get ‘em onside” indeed. Fuck Adam Gee.
What does the opposition’s half look like?
With Tyran Wishart replacing Jennings on the wing,2 Melbourne left flank was always going to be in danger, and Nathan Cleary started working over the Melbourne edges. Repeat sets and a lot of space saw Brian To’o beat Wishart to the corner for the Panthers first try. Their second try coming not too much after through Jarome Luai. An offload error from Christian Welch giving the home team field position, although it wasn’t really an error had Melbourne been able to challenge the decision from Gee. Luai would take advantage of the possession and a retreating Melbourne defensive line.
Down 12–6 Melbourne needed to steady and defend with the ball by playing simple but smart rugby league to try to wrest the match in their favour. Unfortunately errors and a lack of patience would see Penrith maintain possession, with Melbourne hardly seeing any ball inside the opposition half. Another dodgy penalty took Penrith to a 14–6 lead and Melbourne needed to keep it to that until half time.
Alas, it wasn’t to be. Despite Melbourne’s efforts in the first half, Penrith would move to a 20–6 lead before half time. Realistically, that was that for the match. Melbourne were extremely unlikely to come back from that kind of margin. Josh King especially would like to have his final minutes of the half back. His penalty (for a non-crusher) gave the Panthers the gift two points, and his obstruction in not getting back fast enough turned over possession again. The try for Stephen Crichton coming after Cleary and company worked over Melbourne on the left edge.
Malaise
After hardly seeing the opposition half before the break, Melbourne finally had a few tackles in the vicinity of the Panthers line in the first five minutes after half time. On the back of some good runs from Tepai Moeroa and Big NAS, there were signs that Melbourne could work their way into the match.
With two players sent off this weekend already, can anyone adequately explain how Luai stays on the field for his intentional shoulder charge on Nelson Asofa-Solomona? Let alone how our old enemy Luke Pattern3 has deemed it a grade one charge and a fine, rather than a grade two and a lengthy holiday for Luai. If it was NAS doing that hit on Luai, he wouldn’t be playing the rest of 2023. That Gee missed it and allowed Penrith to play on from the loose ball sums up his incompetence.
Penrith bombed the chance from their ill-gotten possession, and after a frustrated Harry Grant4 gave away a ridiculous penalty for an ugly looking, but ultimately harmless and lazy tackle, Penrith extended their lead with the final points of the night. To’o grabbing his second of the night with Melbourne unable to cover that flank again.
Down 20 points with almost 30 minutes remaining, it’s to the team’s credit that Melbourne didn’t let this one blow out any further. I thought Melbourne’s middle was the match of the Panthers, but with Munster and Meaney well covered and the edges looking vulnerable, this result was almost inevitable.
It would have been amusing if Marion Seve had channeled Curtis Scott from 2018 and decked Luai, but that would have been a disservice to his game.
In the final quarter of the game there was more incompetence from Gee (as expected), ineffective attack from Melbourne (as expected) and dominant defence from Penrith (as expected). Melbourne didn’t score and Penrith didn’t either. Small victories?5
Coach quotes
Was a contemplative Bellsa post match:
The Panthers are really good at playing the field position and possession game, and they did a great job there in the first half. But with all due respect we really helped them. We didn’t just shoot ourselves in the foot, we just blew our feet off in the first half. With errors and it looked like we were looking for shortcuts.
The first half was disappointing with how many errors we made. I don’t want to say dumb things, but they were dumb things. The second half was a real arm wrestle and we were probably a bit fatigued… we didn’t look likely to score a try. I was happy with our effort, but the amount of errors we made, you’re never going to go close to beating a team like Penrith.
There are some things we learned tonight, we just need to make sure we work on them. If we do have to play them again, we’ll be a little bit better prepared. You really need to play the patience game against them. Their game plan isn’t too hard to see, but stopping it is another thing.
Was it worth it?
Putting up with Ginnane, Cronk and Hooper on Fox League was always going to be a punish. Watching from home, this one was just a frustrating mess of a game. The replay with the Nine commentators wasn’t much of an improvement either.
There are embers showing that this Melbourne team has got the spark to try and challenge the Panthers, but at the moment they have our measure.
2/10
Storm Machine Player of the Year
There were a number of players who tried hard, but were unable to get one over the opposition. I’ve given points to the three players that I thought had quality games. The effort was there, just the discipline was lacking.
Round 23 points:
1 – Trent Loiero
1 – Young Tonumaipea
1 – Marion Seve
Leaderboard
26 – Harry Grant
18 – Cameron Munster
16 – Jahrome Hughes
13 – Nick Meaney
10 – Christian Welch
9 – Trent Loiero
7 – Nelson Asofa-Solomona
6 – Will Warbrick, Josh King, Xavier Coates
5 – Tui Kamikamica
4 – Eliesa Katoa
2 – Alec MacDonald, Jonah Pezet, Marion Seve
1 – Reimis Smith, Justin Olam, Tom Eisenhuth, Young Tonumaipea
Next up
Canberra Raiders – AAMI Park, Sunday 13 August, 2:00pm
Getting Canberra this week is a tricky one. The Raiders seem to save their best for their trip to Melbourne, with their coach seemingly earning a contract extension every time they beat the Storm but go on to fail in the finals.
Hopefully Jahrome Hughes will be back next week, and looking at the highlights from the Sunshine Coast, Ryan Papenhuyzen might be on the way soon too.
Preview post coming later in the week.
Apologies to Dr Seuss.
If it was me, I would have moved Eisenhuth to left centre, Tonumaipea to left wing and brought on a forward. But then I would have kept Alec MacDonald in the 17 rather than Wishart.
General Bias himself. His grudge against Melbourne is eternal.
While this penalty was there, watch the lead up as to why Grant was frustrated. Spoiler: it was Adam Gee and his inconsistent refereeing.
Luai was again lucky not to have been sent to the sin bin in the 66th minute for a professional foul rather than the set restart afforded by Gee.