Storm beaten by resurgent Newcastle

The Newcastle Knights have defeated an out-of-sorts Melbourne Storm 37-18 at Energy Australia Stadium in Newcastle to show they are far from the 15th best team in the competition.

Before the game Andrew Johns signed a two-year extension to his contract taking him to the end of 2008 and he celebrated in style with an irresistible display. Johns scored a try of his own and played a part in all of the others to show why he is considered by most the greatest player ever to play the game.

The Storm got off to the worst possible start, conceding two tries in the first eight minutes, a deficit that proved insurmountable.

Melbourne has a poor record against the Knights and from the opening minutes, it didn't look like it was going to get any better.

In only the 3rd minute, Jake Webster dropped a high kick, knocking it on to give Newcastle another set of six 15 metres out. From the resultant play, Danny Buderus passed the ball to Johns who found his way through the defence too easily to give the Knights a 6-0 lead.

Five minutes later a banana kick from Johns caught the Storm defence wrong footed. The ball hit the post and the first player to react was Buderus who extended the Knights lead to 12-0.

A controversial try in the 31st minute, awarded by referee Shayne Hayne to Josh Perry after the video referee couldn't make a decision as to whether the ball had been put down, extended the Knights' lead to 18 points.

The Storm managed to get on the scoreboard in the 36th minute. A fantastic inside ball from David Kidwell set Billy Slater on his way toward the try line. Slater showed strength and determination to bust through a couple of tacklers to get the ball down and reduce the deficit to 12 points.

With 23 seconds left of the first half, Johns kicked a field goal which bounced off the cross bar to send his team into the halftime break with a 13 point lead.

The second half started sensationally for the Storm with Dennis Scott slicing through a non-existent Knights defence to give the Melbourne side hope.

However, the joy was short lived when Trent Salkeld crossed after six minutes of the second half for the Knights to give them breathing space once again.

In the 57th minute, Clint Newton showed composure in defence to stop a Matt Orford kick with his legs. He made good ground before off-loading to Anthony Quinn who ran the remaining 50 metres to put the Knights in a seemingly unbeatable position.

With 19 minutes to go, a high ball from Cameron Smith caused confusion in the Newcastle defence with Slater pouncing on the loose ball to give the Storm what looked like a perfectly good try. However, controversy reared its head again when the video referee adjudicated Webster had knocked on.

Moments later, Newcastle took full advantage of heavy pressure applied to Slater to put themselves well clear of Melbourne, with Johns pouncing on the loose ball before off-loading to Buderus for another try.

Cooper Cronk scored a consolation for the Storm when he took the ball from dummy half on the fifth tackle only a metre out to add some respectability to the final score.