The Dragons had five players backing up from Origin, the Tigers had none, what they did have were a couple of commanding throwback performances from the old firm of Benji Marshall and Robbie Farah.

Trailing 20-6 with 11 minutes remaining, the Dragons effort looked very underwhelming before tries to Gareth Widdop and Matt Dufty inside the final 10 made a match of it.

In the end, the 20-16 scoreline flattered them as they suffered their first home loss of the season, and their first on the bounce, to drop to third on the ladder behind Melbourne on percentages. Fans will be hoping Origin hangover was at play, but McGregor dismissed it as a factor following the loss.

“Paul Vaughan played Origin in all three games and was probably the best on the field,” McGregor said.

“If you look at their minutes and the time off they've had in between, you look at their recovery… it's no excuse. We've got a lot of tired guys in the room but they proved, when they went after the opposition towards the end of the game, how good they can be. 

“It's something we'll address as a group when we get back to training on Tuesday. We'll get home and get back together, we haven't been all together for a month, and start walking towards the back end of the year.”

It puts the Dragons right back in a scrap for a top four finish, with the Warriors, Roosters, Sharks and Panthers all drawing within one win of them over the weekend.

The Dragons play the Warriors and Roosters on an otherwise favourable run home, but McGregor said it's important his side take momentum into the post-season.

“I think every team goes through different stages through the journey of the competition where you're playing your best footy and you're a little bit off your best,” McGregor said.

“Today was the start of the last third of the competition. There's always three phases of the season, the first third, the middle third and the back end. We've been good up until today about maintaining our standards against all opposition, but we dropped our standards a touch. 

“Today was a game we wanted to win, needed to win and we didn't win. It's the first time this year we've lost two in a row so you'd like to fix that pretty quick.”

The scores were locked at 6-all at the break after No. 7s Luke Brooks and Ben Hunt traded tries. The Tigers struck first after the resumption, Farah putting Moses Mbye into space through the middle of the ruck, with the new Tiger finding Corey Thompson for the finish.  Farah was in the action again for the Tigers third try, handling three times, including the final deft kick for David Nofoaluma to plant the ball and push the lead out to 18-6.  

Esan Marsters added a penalty goal seven minutes later, before Widdop cut the margin back to eight when he converted his own try off a chip from Hunt.  Another escape act looked in the offing when Dufty crossed in the 76^th minute to cut the margin back to four, but the Tigers steadied down the stretch to snap a four-game losing streak and keep their finals hopes alive.