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1.0 History

1.1 1990s

1.2 2000s

2.0 Emblem and colours

3.0 Rivalries

4.0 Stadium & Attendances

5.0 Statistics and records

5.1 All time head to head record

6.0 2009 squad

7.0 Team of the decade

8.0 Prominent fans

9.0 See also

10.0 References

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Melbourne Storm Wiki Information

The Melbourne Storm are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in the city of Melbourne, Victoria. They have competed in every season of the National Rugby League Premiership since its inception in 1998 and are the first fully-professional rugby league team based in the Australian rules football-dominated state of Victoria.

Melbourne won their first premiership in 1999, only their second season of competition. Over the past three seasons the club has finished minor premiers each year and contested each grand final, winning in 2007. This makes them one of the NRL's most successful clubs in the premiership today. Their coach Craig Bellamy is the incumbent New South Wales State of Origin coach and their captain Cameron Smith has captained the Australian national team.

The Storm currently play their home games at Olympic Park Stadium however plans are in place for the team to move to the new Melbourne Rectangular Stadium upon its completion. Originally a Super League initiative, the Melbourne club is currently 100% owned and operated by News Limited.

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History

1990s

In 1996, the Australian Rugby League (ARL) decided to establish a Melbourne based team due to the high attendances at recent State of Origin matches. But in May 1997, Super League boss John Ribot pushed for a Melbourne based club for the Super League competition, which was the rival against the ARL (Australian Rugby League) competition. ^[1] Former Brisbane Broncos centre Chris Johns became the CEO of the club and Ribot stepped down from the head of Super League to set up the club. In September 1997, Melbourne announced that Chris Anderson would be their foundation coach, and then Super League announced that the new team would be named the Melbourne Storm. ^[2]

The Melbourne club then went forward with signing players from other clubs, including Robbie Ross, Glenn Lazarus, Brett Kimmorley and Scott Hill. With the Super League and ARL joining into one competition for the 1998 season, the Melbourne team became part of the National Rugby League (NRL). In their first ever game, they defeated Illawarra, with Glenn Lazarus as their inaugural captain. Melbourne, in a complete shock to the rest of the competition, won their first four games, before losing to Auckland. ^[3] They went on to make the finals, but were defeated by the eventual premiers, the Brisbane Broncos. ^[4]

In 1999, Melbourne won eight of their first eleven games, and went on to make the finals in third position on the premiership ladder. The team was beaten convincingly 34–10 in the quarter final by St. George Illawarra, but came from behind in both the semi final and preliminary final to make the grand final. Melbourne faced St. George Illawarra in the 1999 grand final, with St. George Illawarra favourites due to their comfortable defeat of Melbourne only three weeks earlier. When St. George Illawarra were ahead 14–0 at half time, Melbourne seemed down and out, but two tries to Melbourne put the score at 18–14 in favour of St. George Illawarra with 15 minute remaining. With three minutes remaining, Melbourne winger Craig Smith was knocked out by a high tackle which caused him to lose the ball over the try line. In a historic video refereeing decision, a penalty try was awarded and Melbourne's Matt Geyer kicked the goal that won Melbourne the 1999 Grand final. ^[5]

2000s

Season 2000 saw Melbourne consistently win after initially losing their first four games of the season. They made the finals (finishing 6th), but were eventually knocked out by Newcastle in the quarter-finals. Between 2001 and 2002, the Melbourne club performed poorly. Cracks were starting to appear between Johns, Ribot and Anderson throughout the period, with Anderson quitting as coach mid-2001, replaced by Mark Murray. The Melbourne club failed to make the finals in 2001. Johns left the club as CEO at the end of 2002 and coach Murray was sacked due to Melbourne's poor form, with the club missing the finals for the second year in a row. Craig Bellamy was announced as the new coach of Melbourne for 2003. ^[6] ^[7]

Between 2003 and 2005, Melbourne made the finals under coach Bellamy, but lost games in the semi finals that prevented them from reaching the grand final. On 17 July 2004, during round 19 of the 2004 NRL season, Danny Williams king-hit Wests Tigers' player Mark O'Neill. Williams defended the incident, using four medical experts to argue on his behalf that he was suffering post-traumatic amnesia when the incident occurred, which he claims was the result of a high tackle by O'Neill just prior to the incident. Despite Williams' claim, he was suspended for 18 weeks by the NRL judiciary. After the decision, Williams stated that he was "obviously disappointed with the outcome". It was the longest suspension in Australian rugby league since Steve Linnane was suspended for twenty weeks for eye-gouging in 1987. In 2006, the Melbourne team won their first minor premiership. Melbourne only lost four games in the season, making them outright leaders by four wins. ^[8] They went on to win their two finals matches, and were subsequently favourites in the grand final. But in the grand final against the Brisbane Broncos, they lost 8–15 in a match where controversial refereeing decisions against Melbourne caused much media coverage. ^[9]

In 2007 they played as they did in 2006, once again finishing on top after 25 rounds. In the first week of the NRL finals, Melbourne played Brisbane, in which Melbourne won 40-0, securing a spot in a preliminary final. In the preliminary final, Melbourne played Parramatta in a game that was tied 10-10 at half time, before a superb second half by Melbourne resulted in the final score of 26-10. The win was particularly satisfying for Melbourne fans, coming soon after Parramatta CEO Denis Fitzgerald said that rugby league should not be promoted in Melbourne. This game drew a larger crowd than chief rival Manly's preliminary final. Melbourne defeated Manly 34-8 in the 2007 NRL Grand Final. The 2007 season for the Melbourne Storm was the most successful year for all time by a premiership winning side in rugby league, with the team losing only 3 games.

In season 2008, Melbourne won their third minor premiership after the 26 rounds of regular competition. Despite becoming the first minor premiers since the McIntyre Final Eight System was introduced to lose their opening finals game 15-18 to the New Zealand Warriors, they then defeated the Brisbane Broncos 16-14, scoring in the last minute of their semi final. Bellamy was fined $50,000 for making scathing remarks regarding the NRL's decision to suspend Cameron Smith over a controversial "grapple tackle" on Brisbane's Sam Thaiday. Bellamy wrongly claimed that the administration was corrupt and that bookkeepers already knew that Smith would be denied the opportunity to play for the rest of the season. Along with Melbourne's CEO, Bellamy questioned the NRL's integrity in their opting to sideline Smith and not others who were guilty of committing similar tackles. In their qualifying final, Melbourne convincingly beat the Cronulla Sharks 28-0. But in their second successive grand final appearance against the Manly Sea Eagles, Manly comprehensively defeated Melbourne 40-0.

At the Dally M Awards for season 2008, Melbourne picked up 6 awards, with 3 to Greg Inglis, and 1 for each of Billy Slater, Cameron Smith and Israel Folau. Billy Slater and Cameron Smith finished 2 points behind Manly's Matt Orford for the Dally M Medal with 22 points each.

Billy Slater was awarded the international player of the year Golden boot award for 2008, following on from Cameron Smith in 2007, which is awarded by an expert panel of rugby league former players and media commentators around the world and is considered recognition for the year's greatest player.

Emblem and colours

Originally, the club favoured the name Melbourne Mavericks with a gunslinger logo holding a fistful of aces. The club officials were all set to go with this until News Limited's Lachlan Murdoch told them to go with something else because the Mavericks sounded too American. So co-CEOs Chris Johns and John Ribot decided to go with the themes lightning, power and storm. The club then became known as the Melbourne Storm.

The Storm was always going to go with the colours of their state, Victoria. These were navy blue with a white 'V'. But club consultant Peter McWhirter, from JAG fashion house, suggested that they should also have purple and gold to make their merchandise more attractive. Gold still appears on the logo, but has now been removed from the Storm's home guernsey, where the colours now consist of navy blue, purple, white and silver.

Rivalries

St George Illawarra Dragons ^[10]. The Storm narrowly beat them in their first grand final in 1999. The following year Anthony Mundine declared that the Storm were not "worthy premiers" in the run up to their round 5 rematch. The Storm responded by beating the Dragons 70-10. In Round 18 the Dragons added to the rivalry by defeating the Storm 50-4. In 2006 Melbourne defeated St. George Illawarra in the Preliminary Final. On 21 July 2008, Storm won a match at Olympic Park 26-0, that was highlighted by several ugly brawls. For the first round of 2009, Storm beat them with a field goal in Golden point (the second time the two teams were drawn at fulltime).

Brisbane Broncos , who defeated the Storm 3055-8 in the 2006 NRL Grand Final. The Storm sought revenge through a 40-0 thrashing in the 2007 Qualifying Final at Olympic Park Stadium, and again with a controversial 16-14 win in the 2008 Preliminary Final at Suncorp Stadium.

Manly Sea Eagles , who the Storm beat in the 2007 Grand Final but lost to in the 2008 re-match.

Stadium & Attendances

Melbourne have played the vast majority of their home matches at the city's Olympic Park Stadium. It was here that the club played their inaugural home match in the fourth round of the 1998 season on 3 April 1998, having come off the back of three successive away victories. In front of what remains the club's record Olympic Park attendance of 20,522, the team recorded a 26–16 victory over the North Sydney Bears. ^[11] The team remained at the ground until the end of the 2000 season. In the 2000 season they attracted an average home attendance of 14,622 still their highest season average. Following steady attendance increases over the three years, it was decided to move home games to the much larger Docklands Stadium for the following year. However, with the team ending up missing the finals, crowd numbers declined and it was decided to move the team back to Olympic Park, where they remained until 2009. They played their last game there in round 25, 29th of August 2009, with a 36-4 thrashing of the Roosters. ^[12] Attendances bottomed out to an average of 8,886 per home game in 2004, but they have steadily risen each year back to an average of 12,474 per home game for the 2008 season. A home attendance record of 33,427 was set in 2007 for the Preliminary Final against Parramatta, at Telstra Dome.

In 2007 the Victorian Government confirmed that it would be building a new 31,500 rectangular stadium at Olympic Park, adjacent to the club's current ground. The Government has stated that the ground will be used for rugby league in 2010. The Storm will be playing their home games at the new stadium. ^[13]

Statistics and records

Melbourne's highest ever point scorer is Matt Orford with 877 points (52 tries, 333 goals and 3 field goals). Cameron Smith (786 - 24 tries, 345 goals) is the highest current player with the most points. Matt Geyer has the most tries in the club's history with 105 tries, followed by current player Billy Slater (95) and Storm legend Marcus Bai (70). Matt Geyer holds the record for most points scored in a season, with 242 (20 tries, 81 goals) in the 1999 premiership season. ^[14]. In his rookie season, former player Israel Folau broke the Storm's club record of most tries in a season by crossing over the line 21 times in 2007, and became the youngest ever player for Australia, at 17 years of age.

Melbourne's highest ever victory was the 64–0 against Wests Tigers on 5 July 2001. The most points they have ever scored is 70, when they defeated the St. George Illawarra Dragons 70–10 on 3 March 2000. However, their biggest defeat was by 46 points to both the Bulldogs (50-4 on 10 August 2003) and to St. George Illawarra (50-4 on 4 June 2000). ^[15]

For regular season home games the record attendances are as follows for the three homegrounds Melbourne have used;

23239 MCG (vs St George-Illawarra 03/03/2000)
20522 Olympic Park (vs Norths 03/04/1998)
20084 Telstra Dome (vs Warriors 17/03/2008)

For home finals the attendance records are as follows;

33427 Telstra Dome (vs Parramatta 23/09/2007)
18247 Olympic Park (vs Sydney City 30/08/1998)

All time head to head record

Over the 12 years that Melbourne have participated in the National Rugby League, they have the following Win-Loss record. ^[16]

Games	Wins	Drawn	Loss	Tries	Goals	F/G	Points	Win %
301	185	5	111	1330	1045	12	7422	62.29%

2009 squad

Although other players may play for the Melbourne Storm during the year, all NRL clubs are required to select a top 25 First Grade squad at the beginning of the season. Below is a list of around 25 players ranked by their cap number at the Melbourne Storm. Parramatta Eels halback Brett Finch was granted an early release from his club after they told him he had no future there. He then signed a short-term deal to play for the Storm in 2009, as part of the second-tier salary cap. ^[17]

No.	Position	Player

No.	Position	Player

Team of the decade

As part of their 10 year celebrations in 2007, Melbourne Storm released a team of the decade. The 17 man team was selected by former assistant coach Greg Brentnall, foundation CEO John Ribot, Daily Telegraph journalist Steve Mascord and board member Frank Stanton. ^[18]

No.	Position	Player
1	FB	Billy Slater
2	WG	Matt Geyer
3	CE	Matt King
4	CE	Greg Inglis
5	WG	Marcus Bai
6	FE	Scott Hill (rugby league)
7	HB	Brett Kimmorley
8	PR	Glenn Lazarus (captain)
9	HK	Cameron Smith

No.	Position	Player
10	PR	Robbie Kearns
11	SR	Ryan Hoffman
12	SR	Stephen Kearney
13	LK	Tawera Nikau
14	RE	Rodney Howe
15	RE	David Kidwell
16	RE	Dallas Johnson
17	RE	Cooper Cronk