S28E10 Preview – Western horizons

Wests Tigers come to Melbourne while the competition looks further afield.

May 08, 2025

Melbourne haven’t lost two matches in a row since round 3 of the 2023 season… could this be the week?

With the official announcement today about the new Perth Bears franchise, my mind turned to the first time the Storm travelled west,1 going deep into the vault this week.

S02E10 – Western Suburbs Magpies vs Melbourne Storm

Ahh 1999. A different time. The dying Wests Magpies took the Storm over to Perth for a one-off match, filling the gap left by the Perth Reds who had been executed by Super League as a result of the formation of the NRL in late 1997. The Perth game was a promotional effort by the West Australian Rugby League which was trying to regenerate interest in the game after the demise of the Reds. The promotion worked in a way with more than 8,000 fans in attendance.

Melbourne picked up a few of the Reds players and three of them would play for the Storm on this day, all who would become future Melbourne Storm captains — Matt Geyer, Rodney Howe, and Robbie Kearns.

Melbourne lined up as per programme, with the only change coming for the Magpies as Micheael Brabek dropped back to the bench and Matthew Spence came into the second row.

This was the first time that Melbourne trotted out in their baggy gold clash jerseys, the first variation of which had the club logo applied in a triangle patch.2 At the time the jersey was certainly very different and definitely a statement. The Storm came into this match in fourth on the table, having beaten the reigning premiers Brisbane Broncos for the second time,3 while Tommy Raudonikis’ Magpies sat in 15th having just one win from their first seven matches.

In commentary for this one over at Lathlain Oval4 were John McCoy, Steve Mortimer and Russell Fairfax. I remember coming home from work that Saturday to watch this one, praising the timezone for having this one at 5:30pm AEST.

Matt Geyer opened the scoring for the Storm in the fourth minute, going over in the right corner after a quick tap from a penalty from Brett Kimmorley. John Gocher awarding the try upon review in the video referee box — likely with the smallest CRT television available. Boofa missed his conversion attempt from out wide.

From there this game got messy. Both teams were making errors, although one pass called forward against Melbourne was, well wrong. The Magpies got on the board from a penalty goal from Brett Hodgson in the 10th minute. That seemed to spark Wests, but Melbourne’s defence held firm against a couple of attacking raids on the back of Storm errors in possession. Geyer’s second try came from a Kimmorley kick out to his wing, Boofa out-jumping Jared Mills in a one-on-one contest, again though his conversion attempt was waived away after hitting the post.

Following a string of penalties against the Magpies, referee Sean Hampstead issued them a warning and Geyer took a gift two points from directly in front of the posts. At 10–2 the Storm had some control over the match until Kevin McGuinness took an intercept from Kimmorley to run 60m to score.

A couple of minutes out from half time the game took a bit of a turn when John Skandalis was sent to the sin bin for fighting with Tawera Nikau. Skandalis had tackled Nikau high then carried on with the biff on the ground after Nikau had him in a headlock. Geyer added to his tally with a penalty goal to take the score to 12–6 which was the half time score.

With the man advantage to start the second half, Melbourne were unable to capitalise as the Magpies were able to control possession and territory. It wasn’t until Paul Marquet was able to gain significant metres in the middle and offload to Kimmorley at midfield that Melbourne were able to blow the game open as Noddy ran away to score untouched. Luck was with Melbourne as Hampstead missed a knock-on from Scott Hill in the previous tackle.

From there the Storm ran riot. Tony Martin and Marcus Bai started making metres down the left flank while Robbie Ross was everywhere. Melbourne’s middle forwards were dominant. Matt Geyer completed his hat-trick in the 52nd minute, he tapped on a loose ball from a Scott Hill high kick to Aaron Moule to score a few minutes later.

The final 20 minutes saw Melbourne score six tries — four of them came in the final ten minutes. Robbie Ross backed up Steve Kearney to score off a set play down the middle, his second was from a similar set up a few minutes later.

As dusk descended in Perth, the gold jerseys were luminous. Rusty Bawden got on the end of great work from Hill and Kimmorley, Geyer scored his fourth finishing a break that started from Melbourne’s own line. As he was lining up the conversion attempt this line echoed around the ground:

You’re weak as piss Magpies.

Ross completed his hat-trick picking up a loose pass from Geyer to get the nod from the video ref, then just on full time Martin completed the rout touching the ball down just inside the dead ball line after Rodney Howe took an intercept and put a kick through in the final minute.

Geyer’s individual haul of 34 points is still the club record,5 with the tally then noted as the sixth best in NSWRL/ARL/NRL history, behind Dave Brown’s 45 points (5 tries and 15 goals for Easts in 1935). When Boofa was told of the news he remarked:

That’s unbelievable. I’ve heard of Dave Brown, he was a point scoring machine and to be sixth best and in that kind of company… I never thought I’d be up there with them.

Geyer would go on to score 230 points in the 1999 regular season with 18 tries and 79 goals, kicking the final points of the 1999 Grand Final to end up with a still club record 242 points for a season.

Western Suburbs – 6 (McGuinness 33' try; Hodgson 1/2 goals)

Melbourne – 62 (Geyer 4', 18', 52', 74', Ross 61', 67', 77', Kimmorley 48', Moule 58', Bawden 70', Martin 80' tries; Geyer 9/13 goals)

Stat attack

This is the third year in a row Melbourne have played on 11 May. In club history there have been five previous matches played on this date, with the Storm facing off twice against the Roosters (losing 6–34 at the SFS in 2002, and winning 28–12 at Gosford in 2009), beating Parramatta 64–10 in 2019’s Magic Round, knocking over the Broncos 24–16 at AAMI Park in 2023, but losing to the Sharks last year at home.
The Storm have lost their past three matches in round 10 and have won 15 of 27 round 10 matches overall.
Melbourne have won their past seven matches against the Wests Tigers, averaging almost 37 points per game. The last time the Tigers won against Melbourne was the 2018 double header played in Auckland.
Since the return of rugby league in May 2020, Grant Atkins has officiated 27 Storm matches with Melbourne winning just 16 for a win percentage of 59%, a 19% decrease from Melbourne’s overall record during that period.
Stefano Utoikamanu made 75 appearances for the Wests Tigers across four seasons. He joins Josh Addo-Carr, Adam Blair, Shawn Blore, Mahe Fonua, Harry Grant, Marika Koroibete, Justin Olam, and Shane Walker to have played for both teams in this fixture.
Jarome Luai has been on the winning team in eight of the 12 matches he’s played against Melbourne, while Sunia Turuva has scored two tries in his six matches against Melbourne, both coming in finals.
Benji Marshall won 10 of the 29 NRL matches he played against Melbourne, scoring a hat trick at the Lilyfield Rectangle in 2010.

Team line-up

Ryan Papenhuyzen
Sualauvi Fa’alogo
Grant Anderson
Nick Meaney
Xavier Coates
Stefano Utoikamanu
Bronson Garlick
Josh King
Shawn Blore
Eliesa Katoa
Trent Loeiro
Tyran Wishart
Alec MacDonald
Tui Kamikamica
Joe Chan
Ativalu Lisati
Lazarus Vaalepu
Kane Bradley
Keagan Russell-Smith
Nelson Asofa-Solomona

Referee: Grant Atkins (Bunker: Kasey Badger)

Preview

Melbourne Storm vs Wests Tigers
— AAMI Park, 2:00pm Sunday 11 May 2025

A deficit of discipline and a faltering of focus has led to… no changes?

The same 17 have been named, but surely, surely there there will be changes before Sunday.6 In any event there will have to be a response from the Storm players who were singled out for criticism by the coaching staff.

There’s still no return from injury/house renovations for Harry Grant, or from concussion for Will Warbrick.

Over at Wests, Benji Marshall has the Tigers on a winning streak of two matches. The last time the Tigers won three matches in a row was 2018. Yeah that floored me a little when I kept looking for the last time that they had won more than two in a row.7 Like Melbourne the Tigers are unchanged from their team last week, even if Brent Naden looked to have picked up a knee injury at Magic Round. Their 2025 recruits — Jarome Luai, Sunia Turuva and Terrell May — look like they have lifted the standards at Concord, with the team finally winning a few more games. Whether that translates to a winning season and a finals appearance might be a little far-fetched, but they are at least looking like a footy team again.

On what promises to be a reasonably fine Sunday afternoon at AAMI Park, this Melbourne Storm team needs to decide what kind of team they are. Can they maintain their discipline and composure when faced with opposition pressure and tactics? Can they find enough focus to execute the game plan in attack? Will the leaders step up and be accountable?

There’s a lot of questions around at the moment for May. While there is plenty of time left in season 2025, I’m intrigued to see what the response is from the players this week.

Nothing is ever certain in sport and while I expect Melbourne to fix some of the issues that have been exposed so far in 2025, this match all of a sudden turns into something of a must-win. A point needs to be made and this might be the week to show that this team can get back on the path to success.

What else is going on?

The Storm under-21s will be in action at AAMI Park prior to the NRL match on Sunday, taking on the Newcastle Knights (kickoff 11:30am). Get in early and support the future of the club. Also hang around after full time on Sunday to support the Storm’s Female Development Squad who will play the North Sydney Bears in a one-off match.

The Bears and Knights travel to Tamworth on Saturday (kickoff 3pm) in the NSW Cup, while the Tigers travel north to Cairns (kickoff 5:30pm) to play their rescheduled round 1 match against the Northern Pride. After a couple of losses on the bounce, a win would be nice, but given the Pride broke their duck against the Jets last weekend it could be an interesting one to watch. The Falcons have the weekend off.

Heading back home, the Sunshine Coast Lightning host the Giants on Sunday (first pass 2pm). The Giants snagged their first win of the season in a stunning result against the Thunderbirds last weekend, so they will be coming into this on a high. The Lightning are in the logjam in the middle of the ladder after four rounds of the competition. A win here could see them bridge the gap to the runaway leaders.