Game 760 – S29E21 Review

South Sydney Rabbitohs 28–26 Melbourne Storm

Jul 27, 2026

Rinse and repeat for Melbourne in 2026. Another half time lead evaporated and more injuries. This cursed season might not be mathematically over, but with five games remaining, it’s done.

South Sydney – 28 (Graham 3', 76', Wighton 8', Smith 50', Johnston 56', Radel 64' tries; Siegwalt 1/3, Ward 1/3 goals)

Melbourne – 26 (Tuimalatu-Brown 17', Keeley 25', Fa’alogo 38', Wishart 67', Meaney 70' tries; Wishart 3/6 goals)

The Fa’alogo try was brilliant right?

Conceding six tries won’t win you football matches

Across their history, Melbourne have won three matches and drawn once when conceding six or more tries. They have lost the other 69 times. When Melbourne concede five or more tries, the club’s record is 23–1–114.1 Simply put: it’s infinitely harder to win rugby league matches when your defence isn’t up to snuff.

Giving up penalties, even dodgy ones, all too often leads to Melbourne standing behind their tryline wondering how they gave up points yet again. The Storm had to have a touch of the Steeden before Souths scored through Campbell Graham. It was soft try too — Graham diving over from dummy half with Tyran Wishart and Sua Fa’alogo unable to stop the centre.

Melbourne’s first set with the ball, well it wasn’t much too much to write home about. Fa’alogo fielded a kick near his own line and Oryn Keeley was tackled to bring up the last tackle just 25m down field. A long kick was good from Jahrome Hughes — and this time Melbourne were able to stymie a Souths set, even if they made far too many metres in comparison.

Could the Storm work their way into the match with the ball in hand? No. No they couldn’t. Nick Meaney’s pass to Siulagi Tuimalata-Brown put his winger into a bind at midfield and such is the way of the Storm, he was dragged into touch.2 Souths would score again and open up an 8–0 lead on the next possession. To watch Jack Wighton run STRAIGHT PAST Jack Howarth… I hate passive defence. It’s such an anathema to the way rugby league should be played. At least if your defence is moving forward at the players with the ball, or trying to make something happen, you can excuse a poor read or a moment where a player was legitimately beaten. But to watch the ball just effortlessly glide past you… the dude does not abide.

A penalty for a lazy tackle from Trent Loiero,3 probably should have set up a third try for the home team, but this time Wighton couldn’t handle a pass — he was probably just shocked to face yet another passive defensive line.

Melbourne finally got the ball over midfield and might have looked to be able to build something of an attack on the Souths line, especially when Fa’alogo had the ball in hand. The fullback is just one player. Melbourne need more than just his speed and footwork. If there was any structure to the way Melbourne were attacking, it wasn’t easily visible.

When Harry Grant entered the field in the 16th minute, maybe his teammates could sense the tide turning. Well such is rugby league in 2026. Stefano Utoikamanu finally got his legs pumping and bent the defensive line to his will. Moses Leo found space with his speed on a kick return to notch a line break. Grant conjured the same penalty he gave up last week and Melbourne had a full set in the Souths redzone. They only needed a couple of plays thanks to Hughes and Fa’alogo. The fullback stepped through tackles, looped in STB who dived over to score his first NRL try. The Victorian breaking his duck in his eighth NRL match.4 He has turned the corner on this spell in the team, maybe he’ll get a new contract for 2027 at this rate of improvement.

It was as if a switch had been flicked — after Melbourne’s sluggish start, it was Souths turn to look like they couldn’t adequately defend. Either that or Melbourne are actually capable of looking like a competent rugby league team on occasions. For most of the second quarter of this match, that might have been true.

The spark that led to Melbourne’s second try was Melbourne’s right edge, conveniently where Utoikamanu had drifted out for what looked like a usual hit up midway through the tackle count. Receiving the ball just inside the Bunnies side of halfway, the big prop forward showed everyone what he can do when receiving the ball when he has forward propulsion instead of being static. He broke the Bunnies defence, bumping out of tackles, waltzing straight past others. The perfect offload back to a support runner (remember those!) in Oryn Keeley who found the line for his first Storm try. Suddenly it was 8–all and Melbourne had 65 minutes to keep this form going.

Melbourne’s right edge was looking dangerous, which was obvious given that’s where Hughes and Fa’alogo feel more comfortable. Grant had started to make the defence second-guess themselves and forced #Kleined to award a penalty… Wishart finally slotting through the first goal of the evening to give Melbourne their first lead of the night.

In the shadows of half time came the brilliance of Sua Fa’alogo on full display. Coming right after Harry Grant limped off into 2027,5 how good was it to see Fa’alogo score his first try since round 16. Receiving the ball deep in Melbourne’s half, spinning out of tackles, stepping out of others, speeding past defenders and making Matt Dufty look a little silly. Fantastic rugby league from the fullback. Just the second crazy try Fa’alogo has scored against the Bunnies in 2026.

When Wishart converted the try to give Melbourne a 16–8 half time lead, it was the 13th time the Storm took a lead to the sheds. That’s not a portent of doom is it?

Why are you the way that you are?

Melbourne started the second half playing the way that we know that they can play. If they could have scored, perhaps a double-digit margin might have been enough. With the ball in hand, things looked to be going okay, even without Grant. Trent Toelau looked to have set himself for a big second half, while Josh King looked spritely in his milestone match.

Defence was the issue. Souths wasted one opportunity when Cody Walker through a pass into touch instead of finding Alex Johnston, but they were able to exploit Melbourne’s passive defence out wide far too easily. Souths were able to get Melbourne on the back foot and allowed Brandon Smith to crash over far too easily to score a try from the ruck. Sigh.

All too easily Melbourne’s half time lead was gone in the 56th minute. Alex Johnston score, because he always does. Melbourne had a lucky escape when the tryscoring machine had thrown a forward pass to botch an easy chance, but on the back of errors, Johnston wouldn’t be denied his usual try against the Storm.

With 20 minutes remaining and the Storm just down by two points with their season on the line, you would hope that aiming up in defence might have been a priority. The field had been tilted in Souths direction for seemingly most of the second half. Then Utoikamanu went into beast mode again, offloading to send Toelau away to… get ankle tapped short of the line. No professional foul in the ruck forced a kick from Hughes6 towards STB who set it back for Meaney to… not score. Souths defence was desperate. Melbourne then melted away again, even after they had tried to pin Souths inside their own half. Souths scored one off the ruck against a broken Storm line. There was effort from some, but not enough as a cohesive unit.

Down by eight points, Melbourne were in need of a miracle. A 16-point turnaround came about because this team’s resilience isn’t what it needs to be — another theme of 2026.

Surprisingly for this cursed season, the miracle did come — Tyran Wishart scored after hard running from Alec MacDonald and Utoikamanu put Souths on their heels. Wishart running with the ball working a treat to beat tackles. Back within two points, a couple of minutes later Melbourne were back in front.

First a moment for the officials and their continued ability to get things arse-backwards as a collective. Colour me surprised that Grant Atkins actually sorted out a review for a change in the Bunker. The set up from Toelau to Hughes in space to pass to Meaney to score, well that was very nice. Meaney remembering that he didn’t need to pass to slice through the line, maybe the lessons from last weekend were front of mind.

Melbourne’s lead though was just two points with eight minutes to play. It didn’t last long. It took an error from Fa’alogo to gift Souths field position from a 40/20 kick, but a better defensive mindset doesn’t allow errors to automatically result in points. Campbell Graham grabbing his second try against a hesitant defence who just give up space and passing lanes all too easily.

There were 3:37 left when Melbourne kicked off — did anyone seriously think the Storm could take this game to extra time or even win from there? If you answered yes, please nurture your optimism and keep it healthy for as long as you can. If like the rest of us you knew, well at least you’re honest.

Can’t have a go at Keeley for trying the Hollywood no-look offload that was intercepted. Can shake my head at Hughes being unable to use his legs to break the line in the final minute when there was space in front of him to run. If he was fully fit, maybe Melbourne’s season wouldn’t be in the morgue, tagged and bagged.

Interchange watch

Melbourne used just 16 players. Guess there was no thought/logic to give any time to Angus Hinchey, Stanley Huen or Manaia Waitere. Instead all three of them went to Redfern on Saturday. Effectively, given the limited time spent on the field by Jack Hetherington, Melbourne used 15 players. Only the starting middle forwards spent any time off the field, with King playing long minutes in his 200th NRL appearance.

The injury to Harry Grant didn’t help matters, but then neither did starting him on the bench. Trent Toelau ended up playing almost an hour, but he did turn in one of his better Storm performances.

Again though, we’re left to question Melbourne’s use of the bench. Just one of many things not quite right about the Storm in 2026.

Post match quotes

Philosophical Bellyache:

There was a few things that didn’t go our way tonight. We scored enough points to win a game of NRL tonight — we scored 26 points, that’s enough to win a NRL game. We just didn’t defend well enough. Sometimes things don’t go your way so you just gotta make sure you defend your way through that and we didn’t do that tonight. We probably haven’t done that all year.
It was disappointing to score that many points and still not get the win. There’s a few weeks to go, we’ll just concentrate on our defence for the next few weeks and hopefully it will improve.
Souths were too good tonight.
I can’t remember the last time we had a bad run as we have had with injuries, but it is what it is, it’s part of footy. We think we have good depth, but we’re not defending well enough to cover that.
When you start using that word “mathematically” you’re in trouble. It will be what it will be. We just need to start defending better. If we do make it or we don’t so be it.

Stat offloads

Of the 29 NRL-era matches that have finished 28–26, Melbourne have lost all four that they’ve been featured. That includes the 2004 loss against Souths at the old SFS.
Craig Bellamy’s point that 26 points is enough to win a NRL match — Melbourne have scored 26+ points in 327 matches. The club has lost 22 of those matches. Since the start of the 2021 season, that number is five losses from 78 matches.
Melbourne have won just once in NSW this season from six matches.
Wayne Bennett coached NRL teams have now won 12 of 46 matches against Craig Bellamy coached Storm teams.
Jack Wighton scored his fourth try in his 25th appearance against Melbourne. On a night where he terrorised Jack Howarth, he ran for 108 metres, including 32 post-contact metres.
In the Fox Sports Lab stats, Jack Howarth was noted with seven missed tackles.

Was it worth it?

This picture of Jahrome Hughes pretty much sums it up:

As foreshadowed in the preview, I spent my Friday night at the MCG instead. Was I watching the other Melbourne team fail to win… well that was a surprise to be sure. Was the attendance at the MCG also five times larger than that at Homebush? Really Souths.7

I was feelin’ fine when Nick Meaney scored with just under ten minutes to go… but season 2026 is cursed and Melbourne are not allowed to have nice things.8

MCG/10

Storm Machine Player of the Year

See round 1 for the ratings explanations.

Round 21

7 — Sua Fa’alogo, Stefano Utoikamanu
6 — Siulagi Tuimalatu-Brown, Josh King, Oryn Keeley
5 — Moses Leo, Tyran Wishart, Jahrome Hughes, Cooper Clarke, Trent Loiero, Trent Toelau, Alec MacDonald
4 — Nick Meaney
2 — Jack Howarth
NR — Harry Grant,9 Jack Hetherington10

Around the grounds

Was it a good Saturday afternoon for the Melbourne Storm? Well no.

The Under 21s suffered a blow in the opening minute — five-eighth Eli Morris was taken off with a concussion. They did bounce back from that though to open the scoring through Ronnic Starkey in the sixth minute. Melbourne would lead 12–0 to be ahead of the clock when Amare Milford scored on the right edge. Souths though woke up and scored the next three tries to take the lead — a converted from from Ben Stringer just before the break levelled the scores at 18–all. After half time Souths took control. Melbourne’s only joy was a try to Victory Isaako which brought Melbourne to within eight points, but that was as good as it got for the Storm with the Bunnies taking a comfortable win.

Following that game the NSW Cup squad strode onto Redfern Oval. Hayden Watson combined with K-Ci Newton-Whare to crash over for the opening try of the afternoon to give Melbourne an early lead. That was the Storm’s only try of the first half as the home team put a three past Melbourne to take a 12–6 lead at the break.11

Souths had capitalised on Storm errors in the first half and that continued early in the second period — two more tries extended the Bunnies advantage to 22–6 with 30 minutes to play.

Melbourne though found some fortitude and fought their way back into the match. Angus Hinchey pounced on a loose ball from a Watson kick that was contested next to the uprights to crash over and score. On the back of some good play down the left flank and a strong run from Stanley Huen, Watson set up another Storm try when Hugo Peel was able to bring down the ball from a kick out to the right edge. With ten to go, Melbourne were within four points.

From the restart Jai Bowden slipped out of a tackle and was able to bounce back to his feet on a big run from dummy half — accelerating towards the line he passed out to Alize Clark in support to score under the posts. Melbourne were level with just six minutes to play.

But it wouldn’t be Melbourne’s day. Jye Gray sparked a Bunnies attack that ended up with a try to Salesi Ataata who crashed over in a three-man tackle that included Peel and Huen.

Looking at the stats… well they weren’t published when I looked. So that’s handy. I did see Shawn Blore out there, that’s different. Manaia Waitere looked to be filling in at five-eighth, that was a little weird.

Scratch that… the stats were published when I looked again on Sunday. Stanley Huen should be getting NRL minutes ahead of Jack Hetherington. Probably the same is true of Josiah Pahulu. In the upcoming matches where the club is out of NRL finals contention, I would probably give a debut to Hayden Watson and maybe Alize Clarke if there’s another injury to an outside back.

Next up

Round 22 vs Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs – Friday 31 July 2026, 8:00pm @ AAMI Park

With not much more that pride and contracts to play for over the remaining five matches, it’s Melbourne’s turn to play spoiler. First up a win over the Bulldogs would put a dent in their march towards an unlikely finals berth.

Preview post online Thursday.

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