With Hayne free to play, even with Cayless potentially out, I'm going for a Parra victory.

Though they've had some solid rest since the end of the regular season, I think the lack of a tough mental game for Melbourne in the finals will see them come undone when it inevitably gets tough in the final. Every game Parra have played in the finals has had extremely tough armwrestle moments and they've come through each one. The mental strength that comes from that will be the difference I think.

A close one to 60 mins then Parra to stretch away. 32-18

Both teams are in great form and it looks set to be a great game. I think it will be close game, but Parra to win it by 6 for me.

supporting parra but i think storm will walk it with ease

I very much doubt any team will win by ease, and i certainly hope that doesnt happen

i bet you said that last season

I think the Storm will win, if they get a couple of tries infront early on i think they'll go on and hammer the Eels. The only game recently where they went a couple of tries behind was at the Dragons and they lost 37-0.
The Storm will go down the left side with Inglis and Hoffman as much as possible and i think they'll get plenty of joy.

Melbourne by 20

Storm

Inglis and Slater are clearly on a mission, if the Broncos game was anything to go by. And you know Smith is still hurting from his omission last year. The Storm are going to be very, very tough.

I worry about Parra's offload-happy game. If they can make it come off again, they can definitely win. But there were signs against the Bulldogs that could get them into trouble very quickly. Their forwards, particularly Hindmarsh, and Hayne in the backs are obviously very important, but I think Inu must play a big role on Sunday if they're to win.

You and me both fella. It looks genius when it comes off, and to watch it as a neutral it's extreme entertainment. But as a (kind of, growing) fan of Parra it's scary to watch as it could go oh so wrong, oh so quickly. My concern is it goes wrong twice in succession and then their heads go and they change the way they play. It'd be all over then.

But up to now it's been working, and maybe they're more head strong than I give them credit for if it starts to go wrong.

Melbourne's only real chance in my eyes is to do two things:

1. Make Parra's offload-happy style pay. Get numbers in the tackles but always with one person with an eye on following up the offload, committed to the ball, not the man.
2. Move in quickly after the play-the ball, and get numbers around Hayne when it goes to him. Not on him, but around him in an arc defence. If he can step back and take his time thinking about what he wants to happen, surveying the field and his teammmates wherabouts, then the opposition often comes unstuck. They need to numbers around him instantly and pressure him, so his thinking is on how to excape, not how to work this in to a try - move up on him, stoping his antics. If you watch a lot of the replays of recent games, the defending players don't talk when they move up on him. Melbourne need to. It needs to be a coordinated effort.

Yeah, there's risks to doing the above, in that you could be outnumbered elsewhere on the field, but the risk of not doing something about it is you lose - like everyone else has done recently (except one off-game)

I hated Anderson when he was at St.Helens but man the guy knows how to make a team play with a certain style, and a successful one at that.

i'm tipping parra, but i dont think either will run away with it as they are at/close to full strength and pretty evenly matched. regardless i hope the megastars hayne, slater, inglis have good games as it will be a great spectacle.

compare the crucial positions :

9 - cameron smith vs who?
7 cooper cronk vs who?
6 brett finch vs who?
1 hayne and slater - cancel each other out

with the GF, test and origin experience storm have in key positions vs the inexperienced halves and hooker of parra, its storm all the way

Inglis and Slater will be too much for Parra to handle.

My heart is going for a Parra win, but my head says the Storm will win.

If Inglis and Slater play the way they can I think it will be Melbourne by about 16

With the amount of Eels off-loads there bound to come up with errors and the way the Storm are playing they'll punish them. I can just see Inglis with a hat-trick of 80 metres intercepts due to Parra keeping the ball alive.
The Eels need a good start to put the Storm under pressure but i cant see anything other than a Storm win, and by atleast 10.