Usually, I’ll have complete faith that we can knock off any team, any time, anywhere. They could be team of Goliaths and we could be fielding a team of Davids and I’d still truly believe that we can win.

But tonight, I’m not so sure. Look, I’d love the Dragons to win - and I’d love to see the Storm lose (God, how I loathe them) - but I can’t be 100 per cent confident. I’m still picking them in the office tipping comp and am still going to sit and watch the game on TV but with a sense of nervousness, a sense that it could all go horribly wrong.

The losses of the last few weeks, especially the embarrassing capitulations against the likes of the Bunnies and Roosters, have given my complete faith a bit of a battering.

I know faith is something that’s supposed to remain even there’s no proof to support it. But I need a little evidence to prove (to myself, at least) that my faith isn’t unfounded.

Going into this game, the best I can do is muster hope. Hope that the Dragons have a sense of occasion, that what they needed was the chance to perform on a big stage. Just like they did against the Sea Eagles a few months ago. People were talking about it as a top of the table clash and the Dragons just shut down Manly and made them look ordinary (which, if you ask me, isn’t too surprising - they’re flat track bullies).

So I’m hoping that the match-up against their nemesis, the ladder-leading Storm on a billion-match winning streak (okay, 11 games) is a big enough stage to lift the Dragons into their best performance of the season.

I’m hoping that, like last year when they copped all that pressure about being chokers, that they’ll use the media battering they’ve had in the last few weeks as fuel to motivate them to turn their season around and prove the knockers wrong.

And I’m hoping that, for the first time in a month, I’ll be happy when the full-time siren sounds.