Newcastle skipper Kurt Gidley saw enough in his team's finals loss to Melbourne on Sunday to back the victors to go on and win this year's premiership.
There may have been some shakiness in the latter stages for the favourites as they conceded back-to-back tries in three minutes after earlier leading 18-0.
But while his team battled back to an eventual 18-8 defeat as he failed to convert either his or Akuila Uate's tries, Gidley didn't hesitate when asked to rate the Storm in this year's title race.
"Yeah I think (so)," Gidley said when asked if Melbourne are the team to beat.
"Their run into the semis I know they lost the last two or whatever it was ... but was it 12 straight they won (before that)?"
"That's an amazing feat and they're a great team, they work hard for each other (and they have a) great coach."
"They'll be hard to beat."
Coach Rick Stone, who will return to an assistant coaching role in 2012 following the mid-season appointment of master coach Wayne Bennett for next year, was pleased with his team's fightback.
"We didn't handle the first half well, obviously a couple of errors that led directly to tries," Stone said.
"I just thought we defended a lot better in the second half too, defended as a group rather than individuals."
"The first half we probably gave away too many cheap metres which gave the Storm a bit of momentum as well.
"The second half was terrific, it was a good contest."
"We threw a few shots at the Storm, it's hard to score tries against the Storm, they're a quality defensive side."
"Probably at 16-0 it's a fairly big start and it probably took us a little bit too long to register our first points to be a realistic chance."
"But (I'm) really happy, (I) just spoke to the boys about that second half."
"There's probably one or two ways it could have gone at 16-0 ... out the back door with a 40-0 scoreline against you or stand up and fight and I definitely saw some great qualities in the second half."