The last time the nib Newcastle Knights went up against the St George Illawarra Dragons, fullback Nathan Ross scored a hat-trick for the first time in his NRL career.
Ross has downplayed his contribution in that match though, saying he was simply in the right place at the right time.
“I scored off a set play and scooped up a loose ball, so I am not going to rest on my laurels from scoring a couple of opportunistic tries," he explained.
"I’ll go out there to do my best in this game.”
The Dragons will be confident after last week’s 30-point thrashing of the Manly Sea Eagles and Ross knows they’ll be riding the wave of momentum.
“Putting 52 points on a quality outfit like Manly, they are a team that we're extremely wary of,” said Ross.
“If we play football like we did against them in the first half last time we played, we should be in for a pretty good running... but if we play like we did in the second half, we’ll probably fall to the same fate as Manly.”
The Knights fullback admits last week they went away from the fundamentals of the game which they plan to fix this Saturday.
Dangerous across the park, Ross maintains their big forwards will be a difficult obstacle.
“Their forwards are really strong, Jack De Belin had an awesome game on the weekend,” explained Ross.
“Russell Packer, Tariq Sims, they run with a lot of intensity, (Paul) Vaughan has been having a tremendous season so we’re expecting their pack to be coming forward.
“We can’t sleep on their backs either; Nene MacDonald has been doing a good job coming out of yardage.”
But the 28-year-old admits being back at home spurs on every player even more.
“Generally we put on a pretty good performance at home and it’s a huge credit to our crowd for getting behind us,” said Ross.
“They really show up week in, week out when we are at home and if they turn up this weekend, at McDonald Jones Stadium, kids get in for free.”
Three grades are in action back at McDonald Jones Stadium, NYC kick off at 10.45pm before ISP at 12.40pm and NRL action at 3pm.
