Tepai Moeroa, Grant Anderson, and Dean Ieremia have all signed new one-year contracts with the Melbourne Storm.
All three were out of contract at the end of 2023, but their departures were strangely not announced among the rest of their departing team.
But that question has now been addressed, with the trio declaring they would remain with the Storm in 2024 as Craig Bellamy’s side looks to go one step further than they did in 2023, when they were eliminated in the preliminary finals by the Penrith Panthers.
“We see a lot of potential and upside in Tep, Grant, and Dean,” said Frank Ponissi, the club’s head of football, in a statement confirming the three acquisitions.
“Overall, we’re really excited to have secured the trio for another year and we’re looking forward to getting them on the park in pre-season to hopefully see them all go to new heights.”
While Moeroa and Anderson both played first-grade in 2023, Ieremia, who was born in Samoa but is recognised as a local youngster for the Storm after playing junior rugby league in Victoria, had an ACL injury in pre-season that halted his season before it ever started.
Prior to it, he made his NRL debut in 2021 and scored 9 tries in 21 games over two seasons.
“Dean had a rough run with injury this year but we’re confident with a good pre-season that we can get him back into a position to put his hand up for selection week-in and week-out,” Ponissi said on the podcast.
Anderson, an outside back, was thrown into the team during an injury crisis in 2022 and has since played 10 NRL games.
“When Grant wasn’t named in the NRL line-up, he was impressing with the Sunshine Coast Falcons.” His Round 27 game against the Broncos was arguably one of the greatest games we’ve seen him play, with two tries, and hopefully we can build on that potential and see more of it during the season.” Ponissi
Moeroa, meanwhile, joined the Storm after playing rugby union.
The former Parramatta Eel played 112 NRL games with the Western Sydney club before joining the Storm, where he has played another 18 NRL games, including the final six regular season games in 2023.
“Tep has a lot of NRL experience and was in particularly good form towards the end of the season in 2023.” “We’ll try to get him a good preseason and hopefully see him reach new heights next year,” Ponissi added.
All three players will join the team for pre-season training in the coming weeks.
