St George Illawarra coach Paul McGregor insists his club isn't about to fall victim to a State of Origin hangover after they dropped into a dogfight for the NRL's top four.
Competition front-runners for the opening half of the season, the Dragons are now fourth after they were beaten 36-18 by the Sydney Roosters on Sunday.
The loss marked the Dragons' second in three weeks since the end of the Origin period, after they earlier went through the opening nine weeks of the competition dropping just one game.
But McGregor hit back at concerns his team were losing their way after they had five players in Origin.
"When you don't win games of footy and get beaten by a side like we did today by that scoreline I can understand those questions," McGregor said.
"We've got good performance staff, an honest playing group and our calendar on our schedule for time off is quite large.
"You can't use fatigue as an excuse, because the guys have been rested."
It leaves them behind the tri-colours on for-and-against, but only two points ahead of the chasing Cronulla, Penrith and Brisbane in a five-way battle for third and fourth spot with five rounds to play.
The Dragons still have the best run home of all those teams, with the eighth-placed Warriors next week their only match against a likely finals-bound team.
Meanwhile Penrith and Cronulla both face top-placed Melbourne still, while the Roosters and Brisbane both have second-placed South Sydney and must still face each other.
"It's (the top four) important around semi-final time," McGregor said.
"We're the only team who has gone coast-to-coast so far in the top four. We're still in there by two points."
Meanwhile the race for the last place in the eight is still alive, after the Warriors were flogged 36-12 by the Gold Coast on Sunday.
It leaves the Wests Tigers four points behind in ninth, after they were shocked by Canterbury on Friday night.
The battle to avoid the wooden spoon also continues.
The Cowboys' win over Newcastle helped them move to 12 points along with Canterbury and Manly.
Manly are edging closer to their first spoon after giving up an 18-point lead with 13 minutes to go in losing to Penrith.
Parramatta (10 points) also blew a chance to move themselves off the bottom of the ladder on Friday night, after they lost 26-20 to South Sydney despite leading 20-6.
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