Thursday’s NRL 2018 Round 3 match is between Melbourne Storm and Nth Queensland Cowboys. The opening kick is set to commence at 20:05 local time with the game to be played at AAMI Park. The home team Melbourne Storm are the favourites for the match. View our preview and teams for the game between Melbourne Storm and Nth Queensland Cowboys.

When: 20:05 | Thursday 22/03/2018

Where: AAMI Park

Preview:

A week after Billy Slater’s 300th milestone game, the Melbourne Storm steel themselves for another big clash in Melbourne.
After succumbing to the surprising Tigers, the defending NRL champions host Jonathan Thurston and the North Queensland Cowboys in a rematch of last year’s Grand Final.
Melbourne lead the series 11-5 since 2010 and have won the last 6 with the Cowboys’ last win over the Storm being a 32-12 win in September 2015.
Over the last two seasons, the Storm are conceding just 13.3 PPG and as a favourite, Craig Bellamy’s men are 23-3-0 since 2017 with the Cowboys 7-9-0 as an underdog.
In night matches since 2010, the Cowboys are 33-43 (43.9 percent) playing interstate in night matches since 2010.

The Verdict

Despite the defeat to the Tigers, the Storm remain unchanged and they’ll be out to avenge a rare blemish in milestone games.
In a massive boost for the Cowboys, they get playmaker Michael Morgan back from an abdominal injury.
This should be a much closer affair than last year’s decider and it wouldn’t be a surprise if this one is decided in the dying minutes.

Unibet Odds: Melbourne Storm 1.64 Nth Queensland Cowboys 2.28

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Teams:

Storm:

1 Billy Slater, 2 Suliasi Vunivalu, 3 Will Chambers, 4 Curtis Scott, 5 Josh Addo-Carr, 6 Cameron Munster, 7 Brodie Croft, 8 Jesse Bromwich, 9 Cameron Smith (c), 10 Nelson Asofa-Solomona, 11 Joe Stimson, 12 Ryan Hoffman, 13 Dale Finucane.

Interchange: 14 Tim Glasby, 15 Kenny Bromwich, 16 Christian Welch, 17 Sam Kasiano. Reserves: 18 Young Tonumaipea, 19 Tui Kamikamica, 20 Billy Waters, 21 Brandon Smith.

Cowboys:

1 Ben Hampton, 2 Kyle Feldt, 3 Justin O’Neill, 4 Javid Bowen, 5 Antonio Winterstein, 6 Michael Morgan, 7 Johnathan Thurston (c), 8 Matthew Scott (c), 9 Jake Granville, 10 Jordan McLean, 11 Gavin Cooper, 12 Coen Hess, 13 Jason Taumalolo. Interchange: 14 Te Maire Martin, 15 John Asiata, 16 Scott Bolton, 17 Ethan Lowe.

Reserves: 18 Corey Jensen, 19 Kyle Laybutt, 20 Francis Molo, 21 Enari Tuala.

NRL News:

Whether he’s at fullback or in his regular No.6 jersey, Melbourne Storm are on high alert for North Queensland’s Michael Morgan in his first appearance of the NRL season.

Morgan is set to play in their NRL grand final rematch at AAMI Park on Thursday night after being sidelined for the first two rounds with an abdominal injury.

Morgan was the star of North Queensland’s fairytale finals surge last season and is a big inclusion as the Cowboys look to make amends for their 34-6 grand final thrashing.

He has reportedly spent time training at fullback, where ex-Storm utility Ben Hampton has been named, although is more likely to play five-eighth to take some pressure off Johnathan Thurston.

Bellamy said he was a danger wherever he lined up.

“We know he’s back and we know the quality of player he is and wherever he is on the field there is going to be danger there when he gets the footy.,” Bellamy said on Wednesday.

“Us sitting round here trying to guess where he’s going to play is going to waste our time, so we’ll prepare for both although we haven’t seen him play at fullback for a while.”

Bellamy said he was more concerned about his own team than who or what North Queensland would bring.

He said they needed to go back to basics to rediscover their NRL premiership-winning form after last week’s disappointing loss to Wests Tigers.

North Queensland are also coming off a last-ditch loss to Brisbane.

Bellamy said his team was “lazy” against the Tigers, with missed tackles and a high error-count contributing to the shock defeat.

“We haven’t been doing the basics well and we haven’t been doing them so well at training either,” he said.

“It was a lazy performance and not working hard enough with doing the basic things well so it’s a bit more consistency that we’re looking for.”

One player who has been consistent and has been rewarded as such is Nelson Asofa-Solomona, with the giant prop promoted to the starting lineup.

The battle between he and former Storm enforcer Jordan McLean should be fierce.

“We’re talking about the team’s consistency being not so great, well, Nelson’s about 180 degrees from that at the moment – he’s probably been our most consistent player and he’s playing great footy,” Bellamy said.

“And Jordan had about 10 runs in 15 minutes there last week so he’s obviously been playing well for them and we know what a quality player he is.”