Brisbane coach Wayne Bennett labelled Sunday night's grand final triumph the sweetest in the Broncos 19-year existence after retiring prop Shane Webcke was given the perfect send off with a spirited 15-8 win over NRL minor premiers Melbourne at Telstra Stadium.

Written off as premiership hopefuls when they stumbled to five straight losses towards the end of the season, the Broncos picked themselves up off the canvas to mount a last season charge towards the title, skipper Darren Lockyer ensuring victory with a 35 metre field goal seven minutes from time.

"I can say personally, and from a team point of view probably the sweetest one for the Broncos," said Bennett, who became the most successful coach in grand final history with his sixth win, all with the Broncos.

"No one gave us, the team, a chance. There was a huge amount of adversity and I've got a huge amount of admiration for them."

For Lockyer the win completed a dream year in which he captained not only the Broncos to the NRL premiership but also Queensland to an Origin series win.

Maligned for his play at five-eighth earlier in the year when there were calls for him to be moved to fullback, Lockyer said it was sweet to prove all the doubters wrong.

"It was an up and down year for us, to come back and win the premiership we worked very hard for it," Lockyer said.

"We weren't expected to win tonight. I'm happy for the guys, especially Webby.

"It's fitting, he deserves it. He definitely played like it was his last game.

"He's put more into the game and more into this team than anyone else has."

For Webcke, the match brought to an end not only a glittering 12-year career but also a draining few weeks which have seen dozens of tributes afforded the retiring prop.

"It's absolutely unbelievable. To finish my career like this is an honour and a privilege, I do not deserve this," he said.

While the match will not go down as one of Webcke's best, he and his fellow forwards did what was needed to give enough space for Lockyer and Clive Churchill medallist Shaun Berrigan to weave their magic.

They were involved in both of the Broncos' tries, including the crucial 61st minute four-pointer which came after Lockyer had decided to run the ball on the last before eventually finding its way to Brent Tate to go over in the corner.

"I thought we'd done a pretty good job on him to be honest until that fifth tackle try," Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy said.

"That sort of hurt us a bit, that was something we were really aware of but we didn't shut it down, that was probably a real turning point in the game."

Down 14-8 with 14 minutes on the clock, the Storm thought they had levelled the match when Matt King appeared to cross for his second try of the night, their celebrations cut short by video referee Bill Harrigan who ruled Ryan Hoffman had knocked-on in the lead up.

Bellamy questioned the call but refused to blame the referee for the result, saying his side simply abandoned the game plan which had got them this far.

"We went away from what we usually do, we were getting too lateral instead of being nice and direct, that's what works for us," Bellamy said.

"In the second half we just didn't hold onto the footy enough to put enough pressure on them.

"I don't know if we were a little bit excited or what."

Bellamy denied the loss took the gloss of what was a stunning romp through the regular season, Melbourne becoming only the second team after Manly in 1983 to lose a grand final after winning the regular season by eight points or more.

"At the end of the day what happened tonight wasn't going to take away from the season we've had," Bellamy said.

"These young guys have done a wonderful job for the club this year and we'd like to think they can only get better."

The Broncos went up 2-0 via a dubious penalty early before a Cooper Cronk 40-20 put Scott Hill in a position to send Steve Turner over out wide.

Turner knocked on moments later to spoil his good work with Berrigan and Lockyer working through a set play to give Justin Hodges an easy passage to the line.

Billy Slater and Greg Inglis both made long kick returns downfield as they evoked memories of Benji Marshall's effort in last year's grand final, but the Storm were left frustrated when wave after wave was repelled by the Broncos defence.

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