Manly have given up leads of 12, 14, 16 and 20 already this season and it looked like that might be the case again at home against the Storm, despite dominating for most of the contest and leading 26-14 with 10 minutes left. But the
Storm rallied with late tries to Nick Meaney and Tyran Wishart to make it 26-20 with five minutes left. Melbourne threw everything at the Sea Eagles and had repeat sets in the dying stages but the desperate defence of the home
side held firm as Anthony Seibold’s men inflicted just the third defeat on the Storm this season.
Melbourne’s defeat came after a mountain of mistakes for Craig Bellamy’s usually polished side, which made a whopping 11 errors and completed 47 percent of their sets – including just six of their first 12. “Our start to both
halves was poor, especially to start the game,” Bellamy said afterwards. “We went 25 minutes and we completed not even 50 per cent, so that put a lot of pressure. You can’t start games like that and expect to win them at this level.”
Rugby league ‘Immortal’ Johns called out a particularly diabolical passage of play for the visitors when Tui Kamikamica threw a pass to Christian Welch that was behind the veteran prop and above his shoulders, leaving the
Storm coach seething in his box after the ball went to ground. “That’s the basic fundamentals of catch and pass, the ball’s gotta be in front,” Johns said in commentary for Nine. “Not up to NRL standard.”
