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They snapped a two-game losing streak, but Bulldogs fullback Luke Patten believes next week's NRL tussle with Manly will say more about his side's premiership credentials than Saturday night's win over St George Illawarra.
The Bulldogs weren't forced to work too hard for the points against the Dragons as they walked away with a comfortable 30-18 win at ANZ Stadium and their focus quickly turned to Saturday night's trip to Brookvale Oval.
With wins over Wests Tigers and Souths prior to Saturday night's defeat of the Dragons, The Bulldogs know a win over Manly on their own home ground will be their biggest scalp of the young season.
"We can take a fair bit of that game, especially defensively, and we'll have to going into Brookvale next weekend," Patten said.
"It will say more about where we're at, I don't think the Dragons would say they're going too great, we didn't play that great either. It's one of those games where you get the two points and then forget about it.
"Manly played pretty well to beat Parramatta, I know they've got a few injuries but they'll still put a pretty decent side out.
"It's a bit of a step up and we're probably looking for that at this stage of the season with the bye coming up the week after."
While it was all positive in the Bulldogs dressing room, it was glum faces for the opposition who have simply forgotten how to win.
The Dragons aren't getting blown off the park, but they are rarely threatening to actually claim victory with gallant late fightbacks the norm over the opening six rounds.
It happened again on Saturday night and again the Dragons are hoping to take that into Friday's Anzac Day game against the Sydney Roosters.
"It's obviously disappointing when you've had a couple of losses, you tend to go into your shell a bit," stand-in skipper Ben Hornby said.
"You can get a bit tense and you want to play conservative to make sure we give ourselves a chance.
"When the game was probably gone the tenseness went away and we started to throw the ball around and we looked better. We've got to take that into next week now, that mentality."
http://www.nrl.com.au/News/Latest/tabid/10244/default.aspx?id=50656
The Bulldogs weren't forced to work too hard for the points against the Dragons as they walked away with a comfortable 30-18 win at ANZ Stadium and their focus quickly turned to Saturday night's trip to Brookvale Oval.
With wins over Wests Tigers and Souths prior to Saturday night's defeat of the Dragons, The Bulldogs know a win over Manly on their own home ground will be their biggest scalp of the young season.
"We can take a fair bit of that game, especially defensively, and we'll have to going into Brookvale next weekend," Patten said.
"It will say more about where we're at, I don't think the Dragons would say they're going too great, we didn't play that great either. It's one of those games where you get the two points and then forget about it.
"Manly played pretty well to beat Parramatta, I know they've got a few injuries but they'll still put a pretty decent side out.
"It's a bit of a step up and we're probably looking for that at this stage of the season with the bye coming up the week after."
While it was all positive in the Bulldogs dressing room, it was glum faces for the opposition who have simply forgotten how to win.
The Dragons aren't getting blown off the park, but they are rarely threatening to actually claim victory with gallant late fightbacks the norm over the opening six rounds.
It happened again on Saturday night and again the Dragons are hoping to take that into Friday's Anzac Day game against the Sydney Roosters.
"It's obviously disappointing when you've had a couple of losses, you tend to go into your shell a bit," stand-in skipper Ben Hornby said.
"You can get a bit tense and you want to play conservative to make sure we give ourselves a chance.
"When the game was probably gone the tenseness went away and we started to throw the ball around and we looked better. We've got to take that into next week now, that mentality."
http://www.nrl.com.au/News/Latest/tabid/10244/default.aspx?id=50656
