Melbourne 26 St George Illawarra 0

THE Storm ran away with last night's match against the Dragons in Melbourne - but not before an explosive first half in which four players were sent to the sideline, with the Dragons forced to play 55 minutes one man down.

The Storm and Dragons spent the opening 20 minutes trying to wear each other down. But when that didn't work both sides resorted to more primitive methods as their Olympic Park clash exploded in a flurry of fists. A wild melee had the crowd on their feet like fight fans and players defied referee Gavin Badger's repeated entreaties for players to "walk away". Instead, Badger almost blew the pea from his whistle as every player on the field was drawn into the brawl's orbit.

Rather than big men shaping up, the main event was a bantamweight title fight with Billy Slater and Jason Nightingale throwing punches. When order finally returned, Dragons five-eighth Jamie Soward copped 10 minutes in the sin bin for sparking the drama with his initial over-reaction to being tackled, Slater wore 10 for running in and escalating the issue while a couple of earlier warnings and active involvement in the heart of the affray had Adam Blair also marched for a 10-minute spell. Storm captain Cam Smith complained his side had been unfairly treated, with three of its players called out to one Dragon.

"Surely more than one of their blokes was running in and throwing punches?" he asked Badger.

Summing up from the bench, Badger concluded: "From now on if we have any more of this again I'll keep sitting blokes down."

The Dragons got the penalty and, with the Storm a man down, Mick Crocker almost dispatched himself, courtesy of his unflinching commitment - bouncing off Justin Poore's hip, straight into the the nearby amusement park. Somehow he found his way back into a sorely tested defensive line. The scoreline held, too but, by the time the trio of miscreants returned, the Dragons had suffered a more enduring catastrophe.

Rather than a 10-minute seat Dragons prop Jason Ryles was sent for a shower for lashing out with his foot in a scrum as he and Jeff Lima took exception to each other's work with the boot. The Dragons complained but Badger was having none of it. "He kicked him, I've got no option, he's off," Badger said. The Storm are a big ask. At home bigger. A man down and to climb that sort of mountain you need oxygen.

"The referee ruined what was going to be a good, tough game of footy. You'd probably call it a hasty decision," complained Dragons coach Nathan Brown afterwards. "I don't think anybody sitting in the rugby league world thought that warranted a send-off; that was just two front-rowers having a bit of pitter-patter."

Even Storm opposite Craig Bellamy agreed. "Twenty years ago if you didn't kick in a scrum you'd get dropped, now they're sent off," he said.

The scale of the Dragons' task was cruelly exposed when, just on half-time, with Smith sniping from dummy half, Lima charged for the line.

A prop short, the job of stopping him fell to centre Matt Cooper, whose normally stout defence wasn't up to the challenge and Lima went over beside the posts to push the Storm out 10-0.

After the break the under-manned Dragons aimed up to the task at hand and kept the wrestle going for nearly 20 minutes. But the cracks began to appear.

Jeremy Smith, a strong as a small ox, will strip next year in the big red V and last night he showed the value of the Dragons' investment, smashing through them for the first try of the second half.

Smith then backed up Folau two minutes later as the youngster got a beautiful pass inside to Smith, who steamed on to the ball before drawing fullback Brett Morris for Steve Turner to score.

MELBOURNE 26 (I Folau, J Lima, J Smith, S Turner, M Geyer tries; C Smith 3 goals) bt ST GEORGE ILLAWARRA 0 at Olympic Park. Crowd: 9335. Referee: G Badger.