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Melbourne Storm strolled to victory in their rugby league trial game against Harlequins in London.
The Storm won 34-10 at The Stoop in Twickenham, a warm-up for their World Club Challenge match against Leeds Rhinos next Sunday (Mon AEDT).
Two tries to Dane Nielsen and one each by Anthony Quinn, Kevin Proctor, Hep Cahill and Rory Kostjasyn set the NRL premiers up, while Gareth Widdop had a near-flawless game with the boot, kicking 10 points.
Storm coach Craig Bellamy was pleased with his team’s performance on a heavy pitch, left soggy by rain and battered by a Harlequins rugby union match the previous day.
“I was really happy with that,” Bellamy said.
“I thought we played really well. I thought we were really good defensively and there were some good signs there from some of our new guys and some of our younger guys. I thought they were very good.”
Secondrower Proctor, who turns 21 on the day of the WCC match, was particularly impressive, as was fellow youngster Widdop playing in place of Australia fullback Billy Slater, who arrived late after the recent All Stars game, which he missed with an ankle injury.
The English-born Widdop, 20, who moved to Australia as a 16-year-old, missed just one of six conversion attempts and showed his versatility when he switched to five-eighth after halftime.
It took Harlequins until well into the second half before they put their first points on the board with a try to Ben Jones-Bishop.
Another Quins try with just eight minutes remaining in the match from Will Sharp proved a small consolation for the locals, who were without several injured senior players.
Harlequins coach Brian McDermott was satisfied with the way his younger players stepped into the void.
“Without getting too excited I thought they were pretty good,” McDermott said.
“We’ve got some structures and and systems in place as well as we look for what the individual can do and I think that lot kept the integrity about what we did today.”
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