Cooper Cronk at centre of reason Storm won't target Nathan Cleary in NRL grand final

The Melbourne Storm are set to take the lessons they learned from their 2018 grand final defeat to the Roosters and put them into action this weekend as they look to prevent Penrith from securing an unprecedented fourth straight premiership. In the 2018 grand final, the Storm's game plan was heavily focused on targeting Roosters halfback Cooper Cronk, who went into the NRL decider with a fractured shoulder blade.

But that tactic spectacularly backfired as they were dominated 21-6. The Storm saw several of their senior players depart following that defeat, including NRL great Billy Slater. And the 2024 team that will take to the park this Sunday will be vastly different to the one that was crestfallen in 2018, with only Cameron Munster, Christian Welch and Nelson Asofa-Solomona left, but the lessons from that 2018 defeat have not been lost.

Much of the talk leading into this Sunday's grand final stems around whether or not the Storm will target Nathan Cleary's shoulder. Cleary missed three games after falling on his left shoulder against the Storm in round 24 before returning for the finals. And he appeared to aggravate the joint instability late in Saturday's 26-6 preliminary final win over Cronulla.

NSW State of Origin doctor Dr Nathan Gibbs told the Sydney Morning Herald on Sunday that one blow could end his game in the NRL decider, prompting further belief Melbourne may look to pay him some extra attention on Sunday. "It is one of those injuries that, unfortunately for Nathan, could happen in the first minute of the grand final," Gibbs said.

"He played (in the first week of the finals) and was very physical and nothing went wrong with it. Right at the end of this game (on Saturday night) he obviously had an episode. If it’s hit in the wrong way with enough force it will cause it to have a subluxation event and, when it slips a little bit and goes straight back in, it just hurts. It can be dysfunctional for a period of time, which can be variable."

But Storm skipper Harry Grant says it isn't in Melbourne's game plan to pay extra attention to the injured halfback in Sunday's showdown. "We don't need to focus on one player, on Nathan and his shoulder," Grant told media on Monday.

"I think he's shown in recent weeks, in recent years, the class player he is and how he performs, whether he's under a bit of an injury cloud or not, in these big games. He's shown that in the last few weeks through his performances, and we won't expect anything different, so we're not going out to target him or handle him any differently than we normally would."

Jahrome Hughes says attacking Nathan Cleary is a mistake

Melbourne halfback Jahrome Hughes says the 2018 defeat showed why you can't afford to pay too much attention to one player and he believes it would be a mistake to worry about targeting Cleary on Sunday. "I think if we focus too much on him and his injury, then I think that's not going to go well for us," Hughes said.

"A few of the boys played in the '18 grand final and they bring up that they probably focused on Cooper too much, more than they needed to, and it probably came back to bite them. We've fully learned from that as a club, and we probably won't be looking at that too much and be more focused on what we could do as a team to be better."

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Cleary has been limited to just 12 matches this season due to hamstring as well as shoulder issues but Hughes says his rival when fit is the best halfback in the game. "I think that Nathan's probably the best player in the game," Hughes said.

"Obviously he hasn't played too much this year, but I think just the influence he has on that team, and just his plays are so skilful, and he can do pretty much everything, so he's the full package."

with AAP