It was a performance bad enough to rile a player as level headed as Jason Nightingale.
But the Dragons winger is hoping St George Illawarra’s round 17 loss to Manly could end up being the turning point of the club’s season.
The Dragons host the Wests Tigers at ANZ Stadium on Sunday looking to bounce back from consecutive losses to the Sea Eagles and the Gold Coast.
St George Illawarra suffered a disappointing 32-12 loss to the Titans at UOW Jubilee Oval, Kogarah on Friday night and Nightingale told the Leader the losses had fired the team up to ensure they had a strong finish to the season.
The result was probably not for the fact that we lost but the way that we played. And that’s always what you focus on.
- Jason Nightingale
“The result [against Manly] was probably not for the fact that we lost but the way that we played. And that’s always what you focus on,” he said.
“That’s why we needed to address it, we couldn’t hide from it. You can get beat by two points and play well but we know we didn’t play well. In saying that you do need to get past it. And once you have addressed it brush it off because this is a long competition and you’re going to have performances like that no matter what team you are. We are in a reasonable position on the ladder and probably the less time we spend looking at that the better and the more time we spend focusing on putting performances on the field.”
The 29-year-old has faced a disrupted time of late, switching between wing and fullback in the absence of Josh Dugan.
The New Zealand international said there had been a change in mindset since the Manly loss. Instead of looking at big games on the horizon, the Dragons are now only looking towards the next weekend.
“I think we probably need to bring our focus back to games and week to week,” he said.
“I think that’s what we got caught up in – before our byes have been our two worst performances, looking too far ahead and what’s going to be happening in the week off, watching ourselves climbing up the ladder instead of earning it. It’s about stringing good performances together. That’s the main thing. I don’t think you look at your opposition too much, you just want to make sure you turn up and play as well as you can every week and the results will come.”
