Match Details
Match Date	11th Apr, 2016
Opponent	Melbourne
Result	Win 18-12
Coach	Des Hasler
Captain	James Graham
Venue	Melbourne (AAMI Park)
Crowd	11,037
Referee	Jared Maxwell Matt Noyen

After suffering the disappointment of losing at Belmore Sports-Ground a week ago Canterbury inflicted the same punishment on Melbourne to hand the Storm their first loss at home this year.

In a high-quality match scores were locked at 12-all for more than 20 minutes at AAMI Park last night. And in a tribute to the desperation of the visitors. the match-winning try saw the hall pass through seven sets of hands.

The unlikely tryscorer was centre Kerrod Holland, recalled to the side this week because of the hamstring tear to Chase Stanley. Holland still had a bit of burrow-ing to do to get through the Storm defenders but he is making a habit of being the Bulldogs saviour.

The Singleton Greyhounds junior was the man who kicked the conversion after the fulltime hooter in the 18-16 round two win over Penrith at Pepper Stadium.

That was the last time he played first grade. A month later he landed three goal kicks from as many attempts including one from the sideline, for a contribution of 10 points to the Bulldogs score.

The win bumped Des Hasler's team from eighth to fifth on the NRL ladder. Melbourne slipped one place to sixth. But after wins over St George Illawarra, Gold Coast and Newcastle before their home fans, the Storm could not come up with the right options to break the Bulldogs' defence.

Hasler said their improved defence was key.

"It’s always tough playing Melbourne in Melbourne and we had to graft one out” Hasler said.

"They had a lot of the field position and momentum but our  defensive effort was pretty brave to keep turning them away. It’s an important two points at this stage of the season.

Bulldog’s skipper James Graham said his side wanted some  redemption after a 14-point loss to Canberra last Monday night.

"It was a very important win for us: Graham told Fox Sports. "We were pretty disappointed last week so we wanted to come down hem and get the two points.

We dug in from the start there and it took a massive effort to hold them off”.

Graham was pivotal to the win with 40 tackles to his name. Bulldogs hooker Michael Lichaa topped the count from both teams with 51 The match opened with a 40-20 kick from Melbourne captain Cameron Smith that put the Bulldogs immediately under pees-, sure Another two sets defending their line took a little petrol early from the players.

But not for Canterbury halfback Moses Mbye who ran 40 metres after deflecting and re-gathering a grubber from Blake Green to score. His opposite num-her Cooper Crook gave up the chase at the 85m mark.

The try set the tone for Canter-bury for the rest of the match and they took a 12-8 lead into halftime.

Melbourne opened the scoring in the first half with a penalty but the rest of the first half belonged to the Bulldogs.

And high among Canterbury's not was winger Sam Perrett. He pulled off a try saving tackle on Cameron Munster in the 27th minute and again on Marika Koroibete seconds from the halftime hooter. Perrett scored himself in the 19th minute.

Storm coach Craig Bellamy rated it as one of their best  performances of the year and said that against any other side they probably would have won.

 I thought our performance was pretty good so it’s frustrating to play like that and lose," Bellamy said. "We would have won most things stats wise except for on the scoreboard.

" The Bulldogs must now deal with a five-day tum around before they have to face the Warriors in Wellington on Saturday. The Storm meet Wests Tigers at Leichhardt Oval on Sunday.

Source: The Australian

LINE UP