A purple Storm hit Magic Round as Melbourne ran up the scoreboard in their 64-10 defeat over the Parramatta Eels at Suncorp Stadium in front of 41,000 people.
The Storm were given a rev up during the week after their poor effort against the Cronulla Sharks last round, and they began their Magic Round clash in the best possible way, taking a 24-6 lead into the break over the Parramatta Eels.
Melbourne opened the scoring in the 12th minute when Cameron Munster cracked the line, the Storm managing to force three repeat sets on the Parramatta line. Munster's try came out of nowhere when Jesse Bromwich forced an offload and the five-eighth got over the line. The second of the Melbourne's tries came through some good work from veteran hooker Cameron Smith who feigned to go one way before turning the ball back inside to Dale Finucane who burrowed over to score the try.
Parramatta cracked the scoreboard just short of the half hour mark when Shaun Lane crossed after some good passing from Mitch Moses, but the hopes of an Eels comeback were short lived. The Storm were able to add another two tries before the half-time break with Josh Addo-Carr scoring off a Munster kick after Blake Ferguson couldn't clean it up - and then on the stroke of half time the Storm extended their lead when Jahrome Hughes crossed, Smith converted for a 24-6 half-time lead.
The Storm were clinical in the opening half, but their dominance grew in the second half when they took their performance to a whole new level. They opened the half with a 100m try to Curtis Scott who took the ball on his own line before going through some awful Parramatta defence to score.
The biggest talking point in terms of gameplay was a tackle from Maika Sivo that saw the Eels' winger sin-binned (and not sent off) for a high tackle on Jahrome Hughes. The Storm looked to cross through Suliasi Vunivalu soon after, but a good effort from Clint Gutherson stopped him, however the issue came when Sivo took Hughes high. After long consideration, the officials elected to sin bin Sivo and place him on report.
The sin bin was just another nail in the coffin of the Eels' night, with Melbourne running in four tries in the ten-minute period that saw Parramatta down to 12, and in that time, they did not even touch the ball. The tries came through Vunivalu who had open space on the wing, Munster scored after he turned the ball back through the middle to Ryan Papenhuyzen who then found Munster in return to score.
Melbourne's try scoring continued when Brodie Croft scored after Curtis Scott kicked inside, and Gutherson lost the ball before Smith cleaned it up and found Croft. The addition of Ryan Papenhuyzen to the game was on show again when he raced through a gap and scored in the left-hand corner and the Storm cracked the half-century just short of the hour mark.
The Storm's scoring wasn't over yet when Jesse Bromwich combined with brother Kenny close to the line when Jesse found Kenny with a short pass and the Storm went out to 58-6. The Eels did add a consolation try when the villain of the night Maika Sivo scored in the corner after a good long ball from Mitch Moses.
The game finished pretty much how it went all night, Papenhuyzen taking a bomb and putting Addo-Carr into space, who then ran 80 metres, givin the Eels no chance of catching him. Will Chambers in game 200 topped the night off with a conversion, and the men in purple and navy sealed a 64-10 victory.
Next weekend, the Melbourne Storm are playing host to the Wests Tigers at AAMI Park, whilst Parramatta head north to Townsville to take on the North Queensland Cowboys.