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Melbourne Storm beat Newcastle Knights 50-2, St George Illawarra Dragons hold on against Wests Tigers

Xavier Coates (centre) has scored seven tries in his past two games. (Getty: Ashley Feder)

The Melbourne Storm have backed up 70 points against the Warriors with 50 against the Knights, sending them to last on the NRL ladder.

Melbourne have scored 120 points in the past two weeks, adding a 50-2 win in Newcastle to their 70-10 victory over the Warriors in round seven.

The latest victory is their fifth in a row, during which they have scored 228 points at an average of 45.6 points a game.

Meanwhile, the Knights lost their sixth straight game after opening the year with back-to-back wins, falling from 14th to 16th on the ladder, behind the Bulldogs on for-and-against, despite starting Sunday 39 points clear of them.

The game started as it meant to go on, with Newcastle booting the kick-off out on the full.

Melbourne crossed twice — through Justin Olam and Xavier Coates — before the Knights even managed to get possession of the ball.

When they finally did get hold of it, the Knights completed their first set only for five-eighth Jake Clifford to then boot the ball out on the full.

Fullback Kalyn Ponga stopped them going further behind with a try-saver on Nick Meaney, finally allowing Newcastle to settle into the game, albeit trailing 10-0.

That quickly became 14-0 when Jahrome Hughes crossed after sparking a break down the right side from broken play, with Xavier Coates kicking back in-field for his halfback to score.

Olam crashed over again on the half-hour, beating four defenders on a barnstorming run from a standing start to sew up his double.

Coates emulated him just before half-time, then went one better shortly after the break, scoring his seventh try in two weeks out on the right wing.

In between Coates's second and third tries, the Knights scored their only points of the game, receiving a penalty on the half-time siren and opting to kick a penalty goal despite trailing 26-0 at the time.

An excellent Harry Grant chip set up Tepai Moeroa for a try immediately after he came onto the ground, but the former NSW Waratah was off again almost straight away with an apparent shoulder injury.

Cameron Munster laid on a try for Nick Meaney with superb spiral pass with his back to the tryline, before Meaney returned the favour, breaking down the right wing before passing back in-field for Munster to join the rout.

Ryan Papenhuyzen, who surprisingly missed out on a try for the first time since round one, slotted a penalty goal shortly before full-time to bring up the half-century for Melbourne.

Dragons vs Tigers

The Tigers have played out another heart-stopper, but this time come out on the wrong side of it, losing 12-6 to the Dragons in Wollongong.

After a 21-20 win over Parramatta and a 23-22 win over Souths in successive weeks, Sunday's game came down to the wire again, although the quality of the game was not quite up to that of previous weeks.

A Wests penalty goal was the only score for almost an hour of the game, before St George Illawarra found the line twice late on.

First Ben Hunt stepped past Oliver Gildart and Starford To'a to cross in the 57th minute, then substitute Jayden Sullivan spied a gap in almost exactly the same spot on the field and scooted from dummy half to score the team's second.

The Tigers hit back through Luke Brooks heading into the final five minutes, but could not pull off another last-gasp victory.

Fixtures

Ladder

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