On a night that started with so much promise, the Dragons were like the party pies in the Kogarah corporate boxes through the opening 40 - piping hot to start, but stone cold by halftime.

The hosts led 18-4 at the 23-minute mark on the back of a three-try blitz that was as impressive as they've looked with the football under coach Shane Flanagan.

What followed was a staggering capitulation that saw the Cowboys run in 42 straight points, a bombed try from back-rower Raymond Faitala-Mariner proving as sharp as turning points get.

The Dragons were well in command of the clash leading 18-4 when a perfectly-weighted Ben Hunt grubber sat up beautifully for Faitala-Mariner in the Cowboys in-goal.

There wasn't a Cowboy within a bull's roar of the rampaging back-rower, but the Steeden inexplicably bounced off his chest and saw a certain try go begging.

It was the axis on which the entire half swung, with the Cowboys scoring next trip up the park, and adding two more in the space of 13 minutes to remarkably lead 22-18 at the break.

It was one-way traffic from there, the Dragons squandering two tries early in the second stanza and allowing the visitors to run away with it at the other end.

"Probably the Ray Faitala-Mariner no-try," Flanagan said when asked where it went wrong.

"We go 24-4 there [if he scored] and it would have been a really nice head start, maybe the opposition are starting to look at the scoreboard, but we didn't handle that no-try and what happened post-that.

"They went and scored 18 unanswered points. I thought there were some positive signs at different stages, but we need to show a little bit more resilience.

"It happened four times, we had an opportunity to score or we got over the try-line and something didn't go right for us.

"Zac Lomax climbed above them and nearly scored, but he didn't, and it goes down the other end and they get points.

"We need to show more resilience defensively. If something goes wrong for us, we just let them march up the field and they got points.

"Defensively we got blown away at the ruck so we need to do some work there. That team's been together for a while and they just capitalised on it."

The Dragons have now conceded 84 points in their past two outings, something Flanagan will need to address quickly with in-form Manly heading south to Wollongong next weekend.

"I'm not happy about our defence," he said.

"We've shown some periods of improvement, especially offensively, I think we can score points, but we need to tidy that up.

"I thought there were some really good patches of football, we looked sharp every time we got into good field position we scored tries.

"We showed that we can score points and we've got some players in there that can play with the football, but we just need to be better defensively.

"It is a new team, some new staff, new coaches and all that. It's going to take some time, but I'd like to think that we can be better than we showed defensively today.

"[There were] just some soft tries there. There's three or four on last tackle that we could have handled better, and maybe at some points the Cowboys competed a little bit harder than us."

The Cowboys posted the opening try through Murray Taulagi just four minutes in, but the Dragons right edge looked to be enjoying a field day in the 16 minutes that followed.

Spearheaded by Hunt, the Dragons ran in what should have been four - and could have been five - tries through 22 minutes, but had just 18 points to show for it.

They looked to have scored the opening try when Hunt put Jack Bird into space, only for his final flick pass to Tyrell Sloan to be called forward.

A near identical lead-up play saw Lomax cross for the Dragons first try 10 minutes in, with with short ball from de Belin putting Hunt into space down the same channel four minutes later.

Sloan loomed in support for the Dragons second four-pointer. When Kyle Flanagan dummied across five minutes later, the Dragons had three tries in nine minutes and a 14-point lead.

Faitala-Mariner's fumbled a try was the telling moment of the match, but it wasn't the only four-pointer they'd leave out there by fulltime. And it told on each occasion.

First Sam McIntyre crossed under the black dot off a sweet dummy-half pass from Reece Robson the set after Faitala-Mariner's fumble.

Next a horror bounce saw Sloan miss grounding a Chad Townsend grubber in the Dragons in-goal by a fingernail, Griffin Neame proving the beneficiary for his side's third try to draw within two.

With all the momentum with the visitors, a Kyle Feldt bat-back of Townsend high ball laid on Scott Drinkwater's 37th minute four-pointer and an unlikely halftime lead.

The Dragons had their chances to get back in the game early in the second half, with Kyle Flanagan soaring into the clear off a Luciano Leilua offload four minutes after the resumption.

A flying Sloan loomed in support unmarked on his inside, only for Flanagan to instead kick ahead. The chase forced a line dropout, with the Cowboys going short and regaining the ball through Jeremiah Nanai.

Drinkwater fired off a 40-20 in the same set, with Kulikefu Finefeuiaki crossing moments later.

The trend continued when Lomax soared above three Cowboys to pull down a kick from Hunt only to spill the ball over the visitors try-line.

Dearden crossed for the Cowboys on their next journey upfield to effectively put the game to bed at 34-18.

The forward pass call that denied Sloan the opening try just minutes in was 50-50, but the hosts simply couldn't take a trick at the right end of the park.

How do you get a read on Flanagan's Dragons?

It's early days, but it remains hard to get a real gauge given how performances have fluctuated wildly over the opening three games.

The Dragons set tongues wagging with an impressive first-up flogging of the Titans, though the way Des Hasler's side was touched up 32-0 by the previously struggling Bulldogs earlier on Saturday meant that victory has not aged well.

They were blown off the park for virtually all of a 38-0 hammering at the hands of the Dolphins last week, but looked to have pulled off an impressive repair job midway through the opening half on Saturday.

Then the wheels came off.

They endured their share of rough fortune, but there was shade of the Dolphins clash in the lapses that allowed the Cowboys to score three tries and reel-in a hard won deficit in the space of 13 minutes.

While the squandered tries were understandably the talking point post-match, the tries the Cowboys ran in in the second half were through lacklustre defence.

It's what saw the bulk of the more than 9000 fans that rocked up for their side's first outing of the year head for the exit with 18 minutes to go.

Flanagan will welcome back Francis Molo, Jaydn Su'A and Jacob Liddle next week, and possibly give Hame Sele his return outing for the Dragons.

Beyond that, the disappointed coach didn't rule out further changes.

"I've given the opportunity for right of reply [from last week]," Flanagan said.

"Did we reply? For 40 minutes, I'd say we did. In the second 40 we didn't, so it's something we've got to look at as a club.

"I think we're better than that, we just need to show some resilience defensively.

"I've got to trust this group to improve and that's where I've got to do my job as well to make them improve.

"Did we improve today? I'm not quite sure, but we'll just keep chipping away and working hard during the week. There's a football side there somewhere."