But I didn't figure that they'd do it by 20 points. Nor did I figure that the game would effectively be over after the first 16 minutes.

That's because I was thinking about last year's Canterbury side. The team that was one of the season's powerhouses in 2009, who dominated most of the games they played.

Add to that the Dogs lasting chagrin about the "controversial" finish to last season's Dragons - Dogs match (my advice? Build a bridge. Get over it) and a desire to atone for the previous week's loss to the Knights and I had them primed to give us a huge challenge.

But no. They were standing still while we racked up 16 points in as many minutes. Then nothing but a piece of brilliance by replacement half Ben Barba could crack the Dragons' stonewall defence (seems that's how we're going to win games at the moment - score a few points and then smash the opposition into the ground. Works for me).

The Dragons were primed and ready to play while the Dogs looked flat and, at times, clueless. And, all of a sudden, Brett Kimmorley is starting to look every bit of his 34 years. His kicks lacked the focus of Soward on the other side and he looked like he was doing his best just to keep up.

And, of course, there was that bellringer he copped from Ben Creagh which he's sure to be feeling in his bones for most of this week.

I'm sure Kimmorley will play better games this season. Just like I'm sure the Dogs will improve on their early season form. The problem is, how long it will take for that to happen. With the finals' race likely to be quite tight, if they Dogs drop too many more early games (which is possible with the Roosters, Eels and Broncos appearing on their draw in the coming weeks) they could be behind the eight ball before the season's half over.

Dogs coach Kevin Moore laid part of the blame for the loss at the feet of the referees. But he's picked the wrong week to do that - his complaints about officials have been totally overshadowed by the awful over-reffing in the Bunnies-Titans game as well as the shameful effort on Sunday that allowed the Eels to score off one of the worst forward passes I've ever seen.

If there wasn't such a dearth of referees, there would be a few guys being dropped to the lower grades after those efforts.

But honestly, the Dogs needed more than a little help from the refs to win on Friday night.