A GEELONG fan who presumptuously had '08 tattooed on his arm prior to the Cats' loss in last Saturday's AFL grand final is hoping the Storm can be inked on to alleviate his embarrassment.

Hawthorn's unexpected victory means last year's Cats-Storm premiership double can't be repeated, and although both clubs were minor premiers in 2008, the parallels stop there, according to Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy.

Geelong, losers of only one game all season, were in unusual territory when the Hawks surged ahead in the third quarter. They were stunned instead of stunning, a team bled of confidence.

"Three goals behind coming out for the final quarter was suddenly a foreign situation for Geelong," said Bellamy of a team that has won an incredible 42 games from the past 45.

"If you're not used to being in a situation, it's hard to adapt. Compared to us, we've been in all different situations. Up in Brisbane, we were down 12-nil at half-time and the week before against the Warriors, we got beaten by a 70-metre try in the last couple of minutes.

"Then we had to go up to Sydney minus our captain and two very important back-rowers [Jeremy Smith and Ryan Hoffman]. Hopefully, over the last month we've met a few situations we haven't confronted before and showed we can handle it."

Bellamy concedes his team may not have made the grand final if it had beaten the Warriors by a mere field goal and then meandered into a grand-final qualifier match in Melbourne after a two-week break. Last year, playing the equivalent game after a fortnight's rest, the Storm would not have beaten Parramatta had the Telstra Dome field been a few centimetres wider.

If rugby league is a game of inches, it is also a sport in which every day's rest counts. Prior to the final-round match against Souths, when the Storm had to win by 26 points to secure their third successive minor premiership, Bellamy again raised an anomaly in the draw that, provided the top two teams made the grand final - the No.1 team had one day's less rest than the No.2 team.

But then he noted a prior booking at Telstra Dome meant the Storm would have to play on Saturday night whether they finished first or second.

The extra day's rest therefore became inconsequential in the Storm's minor premiership quest and totally irrelevant when they lost to the Warriors and were forced onto the road.

Wins in Brisbane and against the Sharks in Sydney on Friday night mean the Storm retrieve that lost day Bellamy has always believed should belong to the minor premiers. Manly beat the Warriors on Saturday night, meaning the No.2 team at the completion of the premiership rounds had one day's less preparation for the grand final.

"That extra 24 hours is a big thing," says the Storm's 28-year-old back-rower, Michael Crocker, who laboured against the Sharks following his highly committed game against the Broncos, played only six days earlier. "I was speaking to 'Boofa' [veteran Matt Geyer] about it this morning. Nine days is very helpful in recovery, getting us fresh and prepared."

Like his coach, Crocker wasn't seeking comparisons with the AFL's minor premiers, who did receive an extra day's preparation over the Hawks.

"I live in Hawthorn so I'm on board with the Hawks", he said, before admitting he was a fan of a Crocker-type mid-field defender.

"I like Campbell Brown - the emotion he had. I want to take that into this game. He's a bloke who should play league."

Geyer is also a Hawks' fan and attended the MCG game wearing a Hawthorn jumper. Asked what he gained from the game, he said: "The joy of my team winning. I wasn't going there to learn."

Bellamy also identified with the Hawks, saying: "They were very patient. They tipped the ball back and took their time. Maybe it was a ploy to slow the game down but they certainly had a lot of guys willing to work very hard."

Asked whether Geelong were laid low Greek-tragedy style by a wounded Achilles, their collapse corresponding with the absence from the field of their concussed captain, Tom Harley, Bellamy avoided the obvious reference to suspended skipper Cameron Smith. "I didn't pick up on that," he said.