{"id":469571,"date":"2025-09-08T20:45:30","date_gmt":"2025-09-08T20:45:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=469571"},"modified":"2025-09-08T23:16:52","modified_gmt":"2025-09-08T23:16:52","slug":"smiths-admission-after-frustrating-ban-for-ex-teammate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=469571","title":{"rendered":"Smith's admission after 'frustrating' ban for ex-teammate"},"content":{"rendered":"

C\ufeffameron Smith<\/a> has conceded the latest suspension for Nelson Asofa-Solomona<\/a> would be "highly frustrating" for those involved at the Storm<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The giant front-rower has had an extremely disrupted season, having spent the start of 2025 still serving a ban from last year that saw him miss the grand final<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Once he worked his way back into the first grade side, Asofa-Solomona was in and out of the Melbourne line-up and copped a two-game suspension after the round 20 loss at the hands of Manly for an elbow on Jake Simpkin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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In just his second game back from that suspension, the New Zealand international was sin binned against the Broncos last Thursday night and has since been slapped with a three-game ban, ruling him out until the grand final, at best, if the Storm make it that far.<\/p>\n

His latest indiscretion – a grade two careless high tackle – has raised concerns for club legend Smith, who admitted the 201cm giant needed to alter his tackling style.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"He can change, it's a technique thing," Smith said on Nine's 100% Footy<\/em>.<\/p>\n

"Nelson Asofa-Solomona is about seven foot tall, so it's pretty hard to get down.<\/p>\n

"But think back to 12 months ago, he missed the grand final because of a suspension – he got done for a shoulder charge on Lindsay Collins.<\/p>\n

Watch the 2025 NRL premiership live and free on Nine and<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

"I believe in that grand final, if Nelson was a part of that game, I think Storm win.<\/p>\n

"He's a huge loss. If you get Nelson on his game, he's one of the best front-rowers in the game when he's got his head on and is playing well. He could really break a game open and he will be sorely missed this week.<\/p>\n

"I think it would be highly frustrating for Craig Bellamy at the moment."\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"NAS<\/p>\n

Asofa-Solomona still has two years\ufeff to run on his contract with the Storm, but has frequently been linked with an early exit.<\/p>\n

He has played 215 games for Melbourne since making his NRL debut a decade ago and was involved in premiership victories for the club in 2017 and 2020. \ufeff<\/p>\n

Melbourne will take on the Bulldogs in a qualifying final on Friday night at AAMI Park. \ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

C\ufeffameron Smith has conceded the latest suspension for Nelson Asofa-Solomona would be "highly frustrating" for those involved at the Storm. The giant front-rower has had […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":469573,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469571"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=469571"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":469576,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469571\/revisions\/469576"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/469573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=469571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=469571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=469571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}