Melbourne storming in to play Bay match

Napier City Council CEO Wayne Jack wants to bring a top league match here. Photo / File

An NRL rugby league match will be played at Napier's McLean Park this year, but it won't involve titleholders and new world champions the South Sydney Rabbitohs.

It will, however, involve two top Australian sides, including glamour side the Melbourne Storm who are giving-up home match advantage at Melbourne AAMI Stadium after being courted by the Napier City Council in negotiations which started more than six months ago.

Council CEO Wayne Jack, driven to bring big events to Napier, said details of the game are currently being notified confidentially to Melbourne Storm members, and a public announcement will be made tomorrow, including revealing the Storm's opposition. It will be played in June or July, and responding to suggestions the champion side had at one stage been lined-up for an earlier date, he said: "It's not the Rabbitohs, but it is still a top Australian side."

Tomorrow's announcement is expected to include ticketing details and flight arrangements to lure hundreds of Melbourne fans to Napier from Australia.

The possibility of an NRL match being played in Napier was first publicly revealed by Hawke's Bay Today in August last year, and NRL and Storm representatives are understood to have monitored the September 6 rugby test between the All Blacks and Argentina at McLean Park to assess its capabilities with a crowd of more than 20,000.

No Napier match was included when the NRL draw was announced in December, although four games did not have confirmed venues. But it's not one of them, the city council negotiations including obtaining consent from the NRL for the transfer of a match from a venue already on the schedule.

The Storm, who include Kiwis player and former Hastings Boys High School rugby star Tohu Harris, have June-July home games against Parramatta Eels on June 15, Brisbane Broncos on June 21, Penrith Panthers on July 17, and St George Illawarra Dragons on July 25.

Melbourne Storm has had an amazing NRL history, having won two grand finals and twice been runner-up in just 17 seasons in the competition. The club first won in 1998, just its second season. Last year the Storm made the top eight, but exited in the first round of playoffs.

There have been two NRL team matches in Hawke's Bay in the past and both played at Hastings' Nelson Park, now the site of a shopping centre.

Manly Sea Eagles played an invitation side on January 26, 1992, at the height of their popularity pre-Warriors and when the Sea Eagles were coached by New Zealand coach Graham Lowe, featuring several top-line Kiwis and sponsored by a New Zealand brewery. Nelson Park was packed with more than 12,000 fans. The other match was on January 21, 1994, when the Canterbury Bulldogs, featuring Kiwis star Jarrod McCracken also played against an invitation team.