Rugby league football has been played and watched by people in the Australian state of Victoria since the early 20th century.

While for most of its history there the game's popularity has been marginal due to the dominance of Australian rules football in Victoria, rugby league's popularity has rapidly increased in recent years in the state's capital of Melbourne,[4] due mainly to the introduction of a professional Melbourne-based team in the national competition.

Luring professional sportsmen, the new code of rugby league arrived in Australia in 1907 and came to dominate the sporting scene in Queensland and New South Wales.

The 1914 Great Britain Lions tour of Australia and New Zealand included a match in Melbourne, the first rugby league game to be played in the state.

[9] The occasional New South Wales Rugby League Premiership match was taken to Melbourne over the following decades - the most notorious being in 1978 when Manly and Western Suburbs initiated their 'Fibros v Silvertails' battles.

[11] The 1990 State of Origin played at Olympic Park, attracted a capacity crowd of 25,800, and three more were held in 1994, 1995 and 1997 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

In August 1991 the NSWRL began to express interest for its 1993 competition,[11] and made a request to the Victorian Rugby League to put forward a proposal.

[13] Plans to enter Melbourne gained momentum in November 1994 when both the ARL and the organisers of the (then called) News Limited rebel competition both began initiatives to fast track their own teams in the Victorian capital.

[13] In 1996, the Australian Rugby League (ARL) decided to establish a Melbourne-based team due to the high attendances at recent State of Origin matches.

[18] In 2007 the Victorian Government confirmed that it would be building a new 31,500 rectangular stadium at Olympic Park, for rugby league, union and soccer.

[19] The opening round of the 2008 season saw 20,084 spectators[20] watch the Storm defeat New Zealand Warriors in their first game at Telstra Dome.

[24] 2015 saw new records set for rugby league in Victoria with 91,513 spectators attending the second Origin match at the MCG, won by NSW.

The Storm who have won four premierships to date: (1999, 2012, 2017, 2020); as of 2022 regularly attract over 16,000 people to matches,[25] and set a new club membership record of over 40,000.

In round 23 2012, Mahe Fonua became the first Victorian-born and bred player to play in the NRL when he made his debut for Melbourne Storm.

He played his junior career for South East Titans (formerly Berwick Bulldogs) in the Victorian Rugby League.