After four disappointing years off the premiership dais, the Sydney Roosters have gotten their hands back on the Provan-Summons trophy, saving their best performance for last to defeat the Melbourne Storm by 21-6 to win their 14th premiership.
Leading into the grand final, which was the first to pit the Roosters up against the Storm, all the talk surrounded whether two of the biggest names in the game would take place in the biggest match of the season for contrasting reasons concerning their shoulders.
Fullback Billy Slater, who has now officially retired from the game, had to beat a grade one shoulder charge to take his place in the decider. It took a marathon tribunal hearing lasting nearly three hours for him to be exonerated.
The 35-year-old was able to convince the panel that the contact he made with Sharks winger Sosaia Feki was with his upper arm, rather than his shoulder, and that his intention was to make an ball-in-all tackle on him, despite replays suggesting otherwise.
While he was cleared to take his place in the Melbourne Storm side for one final time, it still remained to be seen whether Roosters halfback Cooper Cronk would take his after he had suffered a serious shoulder injury in his side’s preliminary final win over the Rabbitohs.
Many were divided on whether he would play, with chopper vision revealing that he struggled to move his left shoulder during the club’s final training session on Saturday.
After much speculation, the 34-year-old, who only twelve months ago was getting ready to gear up for the Storm in his final appearance for the club before moving north, was able to take his place in the starting side, albeit in the unusual jersey number of 23.
He and fullback James Tedesco were brought to the Roosters as they sought the last pieces to their premiership puzzle, the boys from Bondi Junction having fallen short at the preliminary final stage in three of the past four seasons following their 2013 premiership success (in the other, 2016, they finished second-last).
Cooper Cronk of the Roosters (Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)
After starting the season slowly, being 6-5 after eleven rounds, the Roosters went up a gear, dropping just three matches from that point and claiming the minor premiership in the final round thanks to a 44-10 thrashing of wooden spooners the Parramatta Eels.
They finished with the league’s best defensive record (361 points conceded) and points differential (+181), and so entered the finals series as the favourites for the premiership, as they did at the start of the season.
In the qualifying final, they overcame a potentially tricky clash against the Cronulla Sharks, but after conceding the first try they would surge to a 21-12 win, sending them straight to a preliminary final.
There, they would face the Rabbitohs, in what would, fittingly, be the final match to be played at Allianz Stadium before demolition work starts on the venue at the end of the year. In front of a record crowd of 44,380, they would win by 12-4 to qualify for their first Grand Final since 2013.
They faced a Melbourne Storm side which were also bidding to become the first team since the Brisbane Broncos in 1992-93 to win back-to-back titles in a unified competition.
It was clear who had come out to play, and it was the Roosters, who scored their three tries in the first half to take an 18-0 lead into half-time.
The margin could have been larger had Latrell Mitchell, who along with Dylan Napa were making their return from suspension, not missed two conversions, which would’ve seen them lead 22-0 and the match all but out of reach.
Latrell Mitchell of the Roosters (Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images)
Then, after over twenty minutes without a score in the second half, Storm winger Josh Addo-Carr brought his side back into the contest, intercepting a long pass from Luke Keary and running 90 metres to score his side’s only try of the match.
The subsequent conversion from Cameron Smith then saw him become the first hooker in rugby league history to score over 200 points in a season, but that would be as good as it got for Craig Bellamy’s men.
A field goal from Keary, and then another penalty goal to Latrell Mitchell, established the final score of 21-6.
Storm five-eighth Cameron Munster will not want to revisit this match anytime soon as he became the first man since Terry Lamb in 1995 to be sin-binned in a grand final.
In fact, he was marched twice – first for a professional foul in the opening half, and the second for kicking the head of a Roosters opponent two minutes from full-time.
Cameron Munster of the Storm (Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
All in all, it was a disappointing performance from the Storm, who were never really in the contest, and there was no fairytale farewell for Billy Slater, who retires after 319 NRL games and 190 tries at club level, as well as 31 Origins for Queensland (twelve tries) and 30 Tests for Australia (27 tries).
Their second grand final defeat in three years is proof that they will have a lot of work to do if they are to mount the premiership dais once again.
Apart from the retirements of Slater and Ryan Hoffman, who didn’t play in the game, prop forward Tim Glasby is also leaving the club, bound for the Newcastle Knights.
Earlier, the Brisbane Broncos claimed the inaugural NRL Women’s Premiership after defeating the Sydney Roosters by 34-12 in the Grand Final, with Kimiora Nati scoring three tries for the northerners and claiming the inaugural Karyn Murphy Medal for best-on-ground.
In a very short season (three weeks of round robin matches and the Grand Final), the Paul Dyer-coached Broncos have clearly set a benchmark for the league, finishing their campaign undefeated, scoring 110 points and conceding just 30.
It was a disappointing end for the Roosters, who had only qualified for the decider after defeating the Dragons 26-0 in their final round robin match after having dropped their first two matches of the tournament.
And that’s all she wrote in 2018, a year which has seen so much highlights and history being made.
New South Wales took out both Origins, winning the inaugural women’s edition and regaining the men’s shield for just the second time since 2005, while we saw the establishment of the NRL Women’s Premiership in which we were treated to four weeks of outstanding performances from each of the four teams, who notched at least one win each with the Broncos going all the way.
And to finish off, congratulations to the Roosters for winning their 14th premiership, and commiserations to the Storm, who ran out of puff in the end but should still be proud of their achievements.
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