A "filthy" Canberra hit the road this week determined to get their drought-breaking NRL premiership march back on track with victory over St George Illawarra in Wollongong.
The Raiders surrendered a 16-point lead in their last-start loss to Parramatta and winger Jordan Rapana didn't mince his words assessing the defeat, adding they'd use it as motivation.
"As a playing group we are filthy... It was well below our standards and I know the boys will want to bounce back against the Dragons," Rapana said.
"Our last 20 in both halves (againts the Eels) was probably one of our worst performances this year.
"The biggest thing it comes down to is individually owning your mistakes and learning from them.
"We sat down and had a good meeting and individually took ownership of where we stuffed up and hopefully we learn from it.
"The Dragons are a quality team and we and don't have the best record in Wollongong, so it's going to be a tough game."
St George could have four players backing up from State of Origin III, while the Raiders have Queensland enforcer Josh Papalii and NSW centre Jack Wighton.
Injured Canberra and Blues winger Nick Cotric (ankle) is expected to return against the Dragons.
Canberra are fourth with nine games remaining and Rapana is confident they are still contenders to win their first premiership since 1994.
"You can see from the way we've gone this year so far, we haven't just fluked wins, we're up the top for a reason," he said.
"We take a lot of pride in our defence, that's been something that's let us down in the past.
"We're 100 per cent contenders to be in that grand final.
"We've got a big game this week and I feel as though if we can continue to defend as we have been and play the we have then nothing can stop us."
Raiders forward Sia Soliola echoed Rapana and said constructive criticism was crucial to move forward and evolve as a team.
"We didn't live up to the standards we'd spoken about... It doesn't just happen, you have to proactively talk about things and work on things and move on," Soliola said.
