Cultural questions linger for Dragons following Musgrove, Ravalawa scuffle

There were reportedly no punches thrown, but the heated exchange at the team hotel required the intervention of teammates to avoid an escalation of the disagreement the club deemed "unacceptable" in a statement released on Monday night.

With a round-one bye leaving their season-opener almost three weeks away, the players were allowed a night out that occurred without incident in town, with the incident occurring back at the hotel around 6am.

Dragons veteran Aaron Woods told the Footy Talk podcast that there was "nothing to" the incident and that group were "all best mates again" in the immediate aftermath.

"Obviously the game wasn't our best performance, there was a fair bit said about that throughout the weekend," Woods said.

"Afterwards, it was a petty sombre dressing room. We were allowed to have a couple of beers because we don't play for three weeks now.

"We've got the bye round one and we don't play til the last Sunday [of round two]. It was probably the first opportunity in a while that we [could] sit down and bunker in.

"If we go out, one-in, all-in, we all stick together. We ended up coming home and a couple of the boys got a bit rowdy in the hotel room. It's similar to the Latrell [Mitchell] and Jack Wighton.

"There's no police involvement in it, it's just a bit of an argument between men, a little bit of wrestling happened, and afterwards we were all best mates again."

The club will investigate the incident and determine what disciplinary action, if any, is required, with Woods saying the playing group is yet to discuss the matter.

"We haven't adddressed it, we haven't trained yet, we're in tomorrow (Wednesday)," Woods said.

"It's something we'll sit down and talk about. It happened Saturday night, or the early hours of Sunday morning. I'm sure the players that have done something wrong will address it with the group and we'll go from there."

Early indications suggest the incident is well down on the atrocity scale, but it's the last thing the club needed following a pasting at the hands of the Rabbitohs in the annual clash in Mudgee.

It was new recruit Musgrove's first outing in club colours having arrived with a checkered off-field past.

It will again place club culture in the spotlight amid a string of off-field dramas in recent years.

Young five-eighth Talatau Amone is currently subject to the NRL's no-fault stand-down policy after being charged with multiple offences, including grievous bodily harm over and alleged assault in November.

Read more: Amone not going anywhere despite stand-down

He's the second Dragons player to be subjected to the policy after Jack de Belin missed almost three years as he faced sexual assault that were ultimately discontinued following two hung juries.

The end of last season was also plagued by off-field issues, with just three first-grade players attending the end-of-season presentation night, while young guns Jayden Sullivan and Tyrell Sloan both requested releases from their contracts.

It came after the club's 2021 season was de-railed by an infamous team barbecue at the home of former prop Paul Vaughan in contravention of COVID protocols.

It came in direct direct defiance of a club directive, saw Vaughan's contract torn up and the 12 players who attended suspended and hit with more than $300,000 in fines.

Asked about club culture in January, Griffin told the Mercury there was nothing that needed to be addressed in that area.

"People are always going to question you, particularly this club, it's got a high profile, but I don't see anything we need to address [culturally] at all," he said.

"There are things that happen in any club that you fix on the run but we're really optimistic for this year."

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