Melbourne Storm skipper Cameron Smith was strangely absent from this year's NRL grand final but added a personal touch to Collingwood's AFL triumph over St Kilda.

The Storm missed this year's rugby league title decider after playing in the last four when his side was stripped of all competition points for salary cap breaches.

However Smith still got to contribute to a grand final when he was contacted midweek by Magpies coach Mick Malthouse.

Smith explained they wanted to tap into his knowledge of playing in four successive NRL grand finals from 2006 to 2009, and how he managed to back up successfully after the ferocious battle of a midweek State of Origin match.

"After the drawn grand final I got a phone call from Mick Malthouse to come in and have a chat because the leadership group wanted to pick my brain a bit," Smith told radio station SEN.

"I went to talk to Nick Maxwell and big Harry O (O'Brien) for about 40 minutes and they wanted to know about playing State of Origin and then coming out of a big game and then going back to club footy and playing another game.

"Just my mindset going into matches, backing up from big games and how I get up for it.

Smith, who went to the game as a guest of Maxwell, said he told them to forget about the result of the first grand final and just focus on their role in the team for the second game.

He said to disregard the media and to work on things in their control such as what the coach wanted them to do.

"I'm not too sure if it had any bearing on the result, they were outstanding," said the Australian hooker, who was on Monday named in the Kangaroos' Four Nations squad.

On Sunday Smith watched St George Illawarra win their first NRL premiership in 31 years but couldn't help wondering 'what if'.

Melbourne was stripped of their titles they won in 2007 and 2009 as part of their salary cap breach punishment.

Asked if while watching he thought his side could have beaten both contenders he said: "Yeah, I actually was."

"It was a funny feeling because it's the first time I haven't been involved in the finals.

"I remember thinking it doesn't even feel like a grand final because we weren't there."

Although he tipped the Dragons throughout the finals series, Smith was surprised by the margin of the victory.

"The Roosters were right in it and at half-time when they went to the sheds I thought they were the better side," he said.

"I thought the Dragons were going to struggle a bit in the second half.

"But they came back out and Roosters kept playing their style of footy when they were pushing the off-loads and trying to throw the ball around and they made a couple of errors and that's when St George's game just kicked in and they really strangled the Roosters out of the match.

"They've been the most consistent side over the last two years so you could probably say it's the right result."

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