It was boring, scratchy and downright hurt the eyes to watch.

Not even winning coach Paul McGregor and captain Ben Creagh could find a positive in Thursday night's 19-12 victory over Penrith at WIN Stadium.

The question in the media box was repeated dozens of times during the painful 80 minutes - is this the worst game of 2015?

McGregor was asked by Mercury colleague Mitch Jennings in the post-match press conference to list anything that pleased him about the game.

"Nothing, besides it's over and we won," the coach replied.

At the end of the day, what else matters?

None of his players were seriously injured, the club's finals dream remains alive and the Dragons took home those vital two competition points.

Rugby league is a winning business and as far as the record books are concerned, McGregor and his Dragons achieved their goal on August 20, 2015.

But it was the way they did it that had McGregor - and the entire St George Illawarra dressing shed - so livid.

The team made 12 errors, missed 29 tackles, conceded nine penalties and completed just 25 of 36 potential sets.

The Dragons were lucky Penrith had a slightly worse night.

The Panthers may as well have left the team bus at the foot of the mountains, phoned Peter Doust and offered him the two points. At least that way it would have saved 9000 spectators a bit of cash and two Mercury sport journalists three hours on a Thursday night. But perhaps McGregor was too hasty to write the game off.

If the Dragons know they can play like they did and still manage to scrap out a win, that's got to instil some confidence heading into NRL finals.

Finals games are often mistake-riddled and scrappy affairs themselves.

All it takes is another Benji Marshall field goal to score an unlikely win against a Canterbury or Melbourne and all of a sudden the Dragons are staring down the barrel of a grand final appearance.

It's unlikely and I'm not saying it will happen.

Marshall himself was realistic about his own performance following Thursday's game.

The Kiwi halfback kicked what would have been the game-winning field goal in the second half, but also threw the ball to a Panthers player which almost led to a try, and kicked the ball out on the full to hand Panthers the momentum before the break.

It can be rocks or diamonds from Benji, and he just has to hope there's more of the latter when finals roll around.

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FINALS TIME

It's finals time and the Illawarra Mercury wants to share the action with you.

During the finals series of all senior and junior sport throughout August and September, use the #mercuryfinals hashtag of you in sporting gear at the game with friends and family.

So if you are at the Illawarra Premier League, Illawarra Coal League, Group Seven, Illawarra rugby, hockey, baseball, netball or AFL South Coast send us your photos and we will post them online.

We'll also provide regular score updates throughout the finals series to keep you informed of who is bound for premiership glory.

But you don't have to be involved with the Illawarra's premier sporting competitions, we're looking for the best senior and junior photos from across the region.

The Mercury will have prizes throughout the finals for the best photos, just make sure you include the hashtag #mercuryfinals.

You can find the Mercury sport Twitter account using @illawarramerc and @mercury_sports, or the Illawarra Mercury Facebook page.