As in, ‘‘are they back?’’.

For mine, I’d say they’re not back yet but they’re certainly on their way.

The effort against the Storm two weeks ago was strong for an out-of-form side. Some have claimed that the Storm were in second gear and toying with the Dragons. Those people are idiots - the Storm never toys with anyone. They play with a sense of ruthlessness and I’d suggest Craig Bellamy would burst a blood vessel screaming at the team if he thought they were going soft on an opponent.

Last week’s win against the Warriors was another step up from the Storm game. The first half was a little shaky but the second half boasted some moments of great Dragons attack, the sort of stuff that doesn’t happen if you’re out of sorts.

Also, the defensive effort was strong enough to rattle the Warriors and put a bit of pressure on them. The Warriors had hit a purple patch of form (albeit against a range of weaker teams) and so a win over them was never going to be easy.

The effort wasn’t enough to say the Dragons are back - putting the ball dead from the kick-off twice and racing off your tryline to leave a 15m gap in the defence are signs of that.

But they’re back enough to take care of the Penrith Panthers tonight.

They ended a five-game losing streak with a one-point win against Canberra last week but the Panthers season has been one of unfulfilled promise. Their season is well and truly over so they may well be just counting down the minutes until the siren sounds on 2011 for them.

The Dragons, on the other hand, will be looking for further improvement in preparation for what shapes up to be a tough finals series. An impressive win is needed to give them extra confidence for next week.

It’s a must-win game for the Dragons if they want to have any chance of finishing in the top four - though they would also need both the Tigers and Cowboys to lose this weekend (which is a pretty big ask). But even if those games don’t go our way, a win will at least keep us out of the guaranteed sudden-death positions of seventh and eighth.

I just wish it wasn’t the late game on WIN tonight. It’s going to be a tough task staying up that late to watch the game. Plus, the billion commercials they chuck into every ad break don’t help either.