St George Illawarra skipper Ben Hornby says the Dragons have to ensure their bad patches don’t become horrendous ones if they are to be a force in this year’s NRL competition.

While the Dragons are entrenched in the top eight with three impressive wins, they have been let down in a big way by a pair of uncharacteristically-poor halves of football.

The first was against Canterbury in round two when they conceded three first-half tries and then again last Friday against Brisbane when the Broncos raced in four unanswered tries in the opening period.

On both occasions, the slumps have proved terminal to their chances of winning the game, despite a brave fightback against the Broncos reducing the final winning margin to eight points.

“You’ve got to try and stop it at six or 12 points and not blow out that far,” Hornby said of the lapses.

“That’s something we’ve talked about and trying to rectify.

“We’ve come up with two of those bad performances now – we’re hopeful that’s the end of it.

“We’ve just got to start the game better. If you drop that much ball, you’re not going to win any games.”

Despite being named in the centres, Beau Scott looks like lining up in the second row against Cronulla on Saturday night, with Matt Prior having spent much of Wednesday’s training run in Wollongong at left centre.