NRL grand final 2016: After 50 long years, it really is 'Up, Up Cronulla'

Nor was it that two of the best seats in the house were occupied by the one-time deputy mayor of Auburn, Salim Mehajer, and a pneumatic mannequin, both in Melbourne Storm colours. An instant team for an instant celebrity. As not-right as that was, that wasn't the thing either.

The summery mildness of the evening? The Keith Urbanity of the pre-game show? But no. What it was, when the smoke cleared and the football was eventually permitted to begin, was that sea of baby blue that not even Harold Holt could have swum out of. And such a roar that the ground announcer, by asking Sharks fans to "make some noise", risked being given redundancy.

The thing was that the Cronulla Sharks were in a grand final. And then it was that the Sharks were dominating it. In wave upon Andrew Fifita-led wave, they overwhelmed the Storm with speed, possession, enthusiasm, skill, grunt – everything except points.

That the Sharks had so dominated the first half without scoring more than eight points was enough to give any long-suffering fan the heebie jeebies. They were winning everywhere. Fifita was running like a three-quarter. Paul Gallen was churning up the middle as if turning the soil for potatoes. Wade Graham and Luke Lewis were probing the edges while James Maloney and Michael Ennis schemed in the middle. The speed of Ben Barba and Valentine Holmes was quicker than the eye. Winger Sosaia Feki was a repeat escape artist, getting out of the in-goal to foil Melbourne's plan A. Were Melbourne even on the field? Cameron Smith and Cooper Cronk were being monstered, leaving it to Will Chambers to try a centring kick on the last tackle; the machine was slipping gears.

But where were the points? The slimness of Cronulla's half-time lead surely did not seem right. One try, off a rehearsed scrumbase switch between Gallen and Barba, was scant reward. As Cronulla scored, the erstwhile Auburn local government official and his escort were happily chatting among themselves.

They were still chatting when the points finally began to come – to Melbourne. On a familiar formula of simple one-out runs and a repeat penalty, Jesse Bromwich barged over. Cue more heebie-jeebies. This was just beginning to look like games we had seen before: Melbourne, in defiance of every law of rugby league statistics and logic, were back within two points. Melbourne were conceding every metre on the field except the hundredth. Cronulla were beginning to show hints of panic and fatigue. How does the team that has never won deal with the team that refuses ever to be beaten?

While rugby league is a simple and largely repetitive game, grand finals are unique. Last year's was a beautiful elaborate knot that needed extra time before someone could pull the right string. The previous year was a flood. The year before that, a beach party. In 2012, it was a sunset: that feeling of inevitability as the world turned and Melbourne suffocated a Sydney team with their defence. When Melbourne win, the game never feels like it is going any other way. In spite of all the evidence, was this getting that familiar feeling?

Never mind the heebie jeebies, the tension was excruciating when Chambers broke through to put the Storm into the lead. Wait up, wait up, Cronulla!

Melbourne never sacrifice a lead, but Cronulla kept pounding at that defensive wall and of course it had to be that man Fifita to carry no fewer than five Storm defenders across the line and the whole of the Shire back into the lead. Not everyone's cup of tea off the field, Fifita had no rivals on it. Has there ever been a better performance by a prop forward in a big match? Perhaps only Brent Kite in 2008, the last player in that position to win a Clive Churchill Medal.

Yet Melbourne, who had never seemed to get started, were still not finished. Their last efforts were foiled first by a lack of composure and finally by a dauntless Sharks defence. The final passage of play, with Melbourne trying to find an improvisational spark that they have seldom needed, was among the most exciting ever seen in the last seconds of a grand final. Not in the script, not quite right, but get used to it: in their 50th year, the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks are the premiers and will be for the next 12 months, plenty of time for it to start feeling natural and right.