The St George Illawarra Dragons are desperate to back up their upset win over Premiers Cronulla with a similar performance this weekend according to captain Gareth Widdop.

Widdop’s Dragons have been inconsistent to start 2017 beginning with a huge win over Penrith in round before being outplayed by Parramatta in Wollongong the following week. Last Sunday the Saints came marching in, beating rivals Cronulla at Shark Park.

“We want to back it up each and every week and getting the two points, especially a local derby, we should take a lot of confidence out of that and we’re at home again this week,” Widdop said.

“It’s vitally important that we do what we did [against Cronulla] really well and fix up a few of the things we need to work on,” Widdop said.

“After last week [against Parramatta] we wanted to get back to doing the tough stuff and the simple things well and I thought the forwards did that early on in the game and got us going forward.

“Local derbies are always tough and physical and we knew it was going to be a tough challenge.

“The pleasing thing was the defence on our try-line was great and our scramble was great.

“We don’t want to put yourselves in that position too often but it’s certainly a step in the right direction and we can still improve for next week.”

The Dragons will start as favourites against the maligned New Zealand Warriors who have lost back-to-back games.