Melbourne's charge to the minor premiership gathered momentum as they brushed aside Canberra 34-6 in their NRL clash at Olympic Park.

The competition front-runners chalked up their seventh successive victory to maintain a four-point lead over second-placed Manly, and kept the Raiders winless in Melbourne since 2000.

Backing up from Monday night's shellacking of Newcastle, the Storm looked flat and put themselves under pressure with a spate of uncharacteristic errors in the first half, and only led 16-6 at the break.

Canberra, who are outside the eight, also deserved credit as they toiled hard and out-enthused the home side in the chilly seven degree conditions.

But such is the Storm's class that they can play below par and still be comfortable victors.

Halfback Cooper Cronk, in his second match back from an ankle injury, showed he was back to his best in setting up two of his side's six tries through kicks.

The first came five minutes into the match as he put a perfectly-weighted 40-metre kick through which sat up just over the try-line, veteran winger Matt Geyer winning the race to the ball.

His second was similar, seven minutes into the second half, with fellow winger Steve Turner collecting the spoils which opened the lead out to 22-6.

One of the other tries of the night was scored midway through the first half by tearaway teen Israel Folau, who showed he has pace to match his power.

The giant 18-year-old ran on to a pass and palmed off one defender, stepped out of a tackle and then stepped around another in a 30-metre dash to the line.

Canberra almost collected their first try 22 minutes into the match off a Todd Carney bomb, however video referee Chris Ward ruled Phil Graham knocked on as he tried to ground the ball.

They only had to wait another minute to be rewarded after Storm lock Dallas Johnson lost the ball while carting it up from the restart.

This time a Carney pass found former Storm forward Glen Turner, who shrugged off Melbourne centre Matt King to touch down.

King, however, won a reprieve midway through the second half when a long cut-out pass by Cronk found five-eighth Greg Inglis playing on the wing, and he turned the ball back inside to King for the Storm's fifth try of the night.

Inglis, who also scored late in the first stanza, then collected his second of the night with nine minutes remaining when he took the ball from dummy half and dragged four defenders to the line.

In another blow, the Raiders could be without forward Michael Weyman next week after he was knocked out just before half-time while attempting to make a tackle on Storm reserve forward Jeff Lima and was assisted from the field.

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