'We're all going together': How Bellamy built unbreakable culture

As Craig Bellamy stood in the tunnel at AAMI Park preparing to face the music, the media and the mayhem, he paused to gather his thoughts.

The date was April 24, 2010, the day before his team’s Anzac Day clash against the Warriors, and two days after the Storm had been stripped of two premierships and three minor premierships for substantial salary cap breaches.

Bellamy knew a hostile reception awaited him, but someone had to bite the bullet and deliver a message of defiance, and also one of hope to the club’s loyal fans whose hearts had been shattered.

“We were just about to train that morning, and it was set up for me to go out and then I’m pretty sure it was Billy Slater who said, ‘What’s happening’, and I said, ‘I’m going out to front the media’,” Bellamy recalls, some 15 years and three premierships later.

“Bill said, ‘there’s going to be a lot of people out there, who’s going with you?’

“I said, ‘I’m on my own’ and he said, ‘you’re not going on your own, we’re all going’.

“I said, ‘No mate’ and he said, ‘No way in the world you are going on your own’.

“He rounded the boys up and away we went, and it was a great feeling to have that support.”

From Cam Smith to Cam Munster, Ryan Hoffman to Ryan Hinchcliffe and Ryan Papenhuyzen, the mutual respect between Bellamy and his men is a constant thread in Revealed: Craig Bellamy - Inside the Storm that premieres this Sunday on Stan.

And if ever a team needed to stick solid it was the Storm in 2010 after they were stripped of the 2007 and 2009 premierships and told they would not accrue any competition points for the rest of the season – no matter how many games they won.

“The biggest thing for me was the fans. They could have abandoned us, but they didn’t, so we wanted to keep putting in and keep working hard for them,” Bellamy said.

“These people were still turning up supporting us even though we were playing for nothing, so we owed them something and we owed each other something.

“The first two games we had was like ‘we’ll show you we’re a good team’, and we beat the Warriors on Anzac Day and then the Cowboys, but after that couple of weeks it started falling away a bit.

“After a month of that we said we’d do it for the fans, we didn’t want to abandon them.

“We wanted to play the footy we knew were capable of playing and that’s what drove us for the rest of the year, and I think that really helped us in the next couple of years.

“If we had just dropped off then it would have taken a lot longer to get back up that ladder.”

History shows that the Storm managed to win nine of their 17 games while playing for no points in 2010 before claiming the minor premiership in 2011 and the NRL crown in 2012.

Two more premierships (2017 and 2020) and five minor premierships (2016, 2017, 2019, 2021 and 2024) have followed, with the Storm’s sustained excellence the envy of sporting organisations around the country.

A plethora of superstars have donned the Storm jersey over the past two decades, but the one constant has been Bellamy, who is entering his 22nd and possibly final season at the helm.

Renowned for wearing his heart on his sleeve, particularly in the coach’s box during games, Bellamy is adamant he has mellowed with each passing year in the high stress world of NRL coaching.

“The last five or six years I have been fairly different to be quite honest, I’m not as emotional as I used to be,” he said.

“I still see signs of that emotion, but I have calmed a touch as I’ve got older and I think I’m a bit easier to be around during the week, especially after a loss.

“We all learn as we go on and mature a bit as we get older.”

He may be in his mid-60s and a doting grandfather of four, but Bellamy still gets into the Storm gym every morning and rips in, although he admits ‘these younger blokes could walk as fast as I run on the treadmill’.

“I’m not as intense as I was 20 years ago but I still get in there and try and stay fit. If the young blokes get something out of seeing me in there then that’s good,” he said.

“I’ve enjoyed coaching all of them [over the years] and I hope in a little way I can help them achieve their goals in footy and in life.”