Craig Bellamy is not a coach who keep his opinions to himself and the Storm mentor laid into his own players in a savage take-down.

Melbourne Storm coach Craig Bellamy has blasted his own players after a shock 36-30 loss to the Manly Sea Eagles on Thursday night.

The Storm have established themselves as NRL heavyweights under Bellamy’s guidance and TV cameras often enjoy filming the coach’s box when he’s watching his team in action.

Bellamy wears his heart on his sleeve as he watches games and while he often composes himself when he gets to the post-match press conference, this time he wasn’t holding back.

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The final scoreline was flattering for the Storm, who scored four tries in the final six minutes, after being down 36-12 before Nelson Asofa-Solomona’s 75th minute four-pointer.

“After 60 minutes we were getting what we deserved,” Bellamy said.

“We sparked a bit at the end but that’s too late. If you’re going to win games here, you need to be consistent the whole 80 minutes and we certainly weren’t.

“I was just really disappointed in our defence and really disappointed in some individual performances that just weren’t up to scratch.

“In that first hour there were tries that should not have been scored.

“Our (lack of) combinations affects our point scoring a little bit but it doesn’t stop you from putting your body in front and tackling someone and working to a defensive system which we were all over the place, especially in that first hour.

“Just make your tackles. How many soft tries did they score by just running through us? At the end of the day, that’s not good enough. Hopefully we can get a bit better.”

Bellamy conceded the “effort areas” have been good this season and said he didn’t want to kick his side while they were down, but he’d already delivered some telling verbal blows.

The high scoring shootout moved the Sea Eagles back into the top eight and appears set to open a six-point lead to the top of the ladder if the Panthers can defeat the Roosters on Friday night.

The loss also opens up the possibility the Cowboys could join the Storm on 24 points if North Queensland can beat the Brisbane Broncos on Saturday evening.

The result comes after a representative round which saw plenty of players out of the Storm system.

Queensland stars Cameron Munster, Felise Kaufusi and Harry Grant played in State of Origin II while Jesse Bromwich, Kenny Bromwich, Jahrome Hughes, Asofa-Solomona and Brandon Smith all represented New Zealand. Justin Olam also played for Papua New Guinea and Tui Kamikamica represented Fiji.

Munster missed the match due to a shoulder injury sustained in Origin, while Kaufusi flew to America after his father fell ill.

Despite the strong representative presence in his side, Bellamy was not using it as an excuse.

“If you want to come up with some excuses you can but at the end of the day, in past years when we’ve had rep round our guys have really worn it as a badge of honour to back up and back up playing well, I’m not quite sure we did that today,” he said.

“We had no energy or intent tonight which was really disappointing. If you put your hand up to play, well you need to play well.

“We expect everyone in our 17 to put effort in, especially defensively and that didn’t happen tonight.”

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