Match Report: Round 4 vs Storm

Tim Sheens' men trailed by just six points after 30 minutes, but two late first half tries kept the Storm at arms length for the entirety of the second half.

Wests Tigers looked to have survived an early attacking raid, only for Nick Meaney to post the first points of the night after an offside penalty.

The visitors had a pair of early chances inside the opposition redzone, but two misdirected passes from Luke Brooks saw the Storm reclaim possession.

Craig Bellamy's side made the joint-venture pay for their inability to finish as Jonah Pezet and Eliesa combined to give Will Warbrick his first NRL try.

Minutes later, Pezet and Katoa linked up again to break through the defence and send Nick Meaney away to the line.

With Stefano Utoikamanu and David Klemmer off the field, Tim Sheens shifted John Bateman into the middle of the park and quickly found success as the English forward skipped across the field and set up a four pointer for Asu Kepaoa.

However, Melbourne quickly negated Bateman’s effort as a Xavier Coates tap-back fell into the waiting arms of Justin Olam.

Cameron Munster then extended the lead to sixteen points with a try on the stroke of halftime.

The second forty started in catastrophic fashion for the visitors, with Charlie Staines throwing the ball back to Melbourne just ten metres out from the goal line.

Wests Tigers repelled the Storm on that occasion and were eventually rewarded for their defensive resilience as skipper Api Koroisau chased his own grubber kick to score his first try in the black, white and orange.

With the result hanging in the balance, a scrum win against the feed in the 63rd minute put Melbourne in position to increase their buffer to 12 points, where it remained until full-time.

Despite the loss, there were several strong individual performances with eight players clocking over 100 running metres.

John Bateman led the way in defence by making 45 tackles and missing only one.

Wests Tigers will now turn their attention to their next interstate trip, where they will travel up to Brisbane to face the Broncos next Saturday night.