Melbourne Storm coach Craig Bellamy reflected on winning the club’s sixth minor premiership, admitting the honour is “a little underrated.”
The Storm wrapped up the minor premiership with a 48-6 thumping of the Dolphins at AAMI Park on Saturday.
They came into Round 25 four points ahead of the second-placed Panthers, but after Penrith’s loss to Canberra in the earlier game all the Storm had to do was win to claim the J.J Giltinan Shield.
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Bellamy admitted winning the minor premiership with two rounds to go was “unexpected” but added: “The Raiders did us a little favour earlier in the day.”
“We were aware that we could wrap up a top-two spot tonight but we hardly talked about it this week,” he said.
“We sort of knew before the game we were playing for the minor premiership, but we still didn’t mention it before the game. It got mentioned at half time and (we said) ‘just keep the foot on the pedal’ and go from there.”
The Storm have won the minor premiership in 2011, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2021 and now 2024 — all of which Bellamy was head coach for.
Although the premiership is every club’s main goal, Bellamy believes the minor premiership doesn’t get the respect it deserves.
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“For me, it’s a pretty big thing. I think the minor premiership is a little understated or underrated,” he said.
“If you look at it in a real simplistic way in that to be the minor premiers you’ve got to have more wins than anybody else so you’ve got to be the best team for 27 weeks.
“But to be the competition winner, you’ve probably only need to be the best team for four weeks — you need to obviously get there (first).
“So I think it’s a little bit underrated, understated… but having said that by Tuesday everyone would have forgotten who won the minor premiership.”
Storm skipper Harry Grant echoed Bellamy, saying the honour “means a lot” and the playing group “should take a lot of belief and confidence out of that.”
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Front and centre of the win that sealed top spot was the Storm’s star-studded spine. Grant scored a try and set up two more, while also making 25 tackles with no misses. Ryan Papenhuyzen finished with three try assists and five linebreak assists, Jahrome Hughes scored a try, set up two more and ran 145 metres, while Cameron Munster’s running game was also on fire.
The spine has endured a lot of chopping and changing throughout the year off the back of injuries to Papenhuyzen and Munster but seem to be firing at exactly the right time.
What’s scary for fellow finals-bound teams though is that Grant believes there’s still room for improvement.
“We’ve definitely had some good conversations as a spine and are starting to play some footy,” he said.
“But there’s definitely plenty to work on for us, so that’s going to come down to conversations and trying to fast-track that.”
Topping off the big win was Nelson Asofa-Solomona scoring in his 200th NRL game after suffering an injury scare in the first half.
“It was great to see him score that try,” Bellamy said.
“He’s been a very valuable member of this team and club for a long period of time. We wanted to celebrate that occasion tonight and I think we did.”
Asofa-Solomona suffered a cork but was able to return to the field. He could be one of the players that will put their feet up next round with Bellamy confirming he’ll be “doing some resting” next week.
Two players that he all but confirmed will get Thursday’s clash with the Cowboys off are Grant and Hughes.
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