http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sp...mate-darius-boyd/story-e6frexnr-1226123541630
ST GEORGE Illawarra winger Jason Nightingale has broken his silence on a training blow-up with departing fullback Darius Boyd, labelling the rumours a "dog shot".
As the Dragons aim to snap a five-match losing streak against the Warriors at WIN Stadium today, Nightingale was forced to defend talk he and Boyd were involved in a training fracas.
It was rumoured that the pair had heated words before needing to be separated.
"I heard it floating around last week and we thought we'd quashed it because there's absolutely no truth to it," Nightingale said.
"Darius has never had a run-in with anyone in our team. It was a bit of a personal attack and a dog shot I think to bring that up when there was no truth behind it. I'd like to know where it actually came from because whether they think they heard something or what, I'm not sure. It's weird for something like that to be created out of nothing."
The Sunday Telegraph was also told there were further fractures emerging in the premiers' camp due to a widening rift between departing coach Wayne Bennett and chief executive Peter Doust.
Both have denied there are any issues.
What can't be denied is the Dragons have only won three of 12 games since the State of Origin period tore them apart.
They are struggling to score points, with the Roosters and Melbourne holding them scoreless in the second half over the past fortnight.
The Dragons players are refusing to blame Bennett's departure for their end-of-season fade out, labelling the super coach's exit little more than an easy excuse.
However, Nightingale admitted the reliance on running left-edge attacking plays aimed at
Matt Cooper and
Brett Morris linking off Boyd had become predictable.
Today, the return of right centre Gasnier and left winger Morris means St George Illawarra will be at full strength a fortnight from the finals.
"Obviously we score a lot more points down our left side and we were missing Gaz last week, who is a such an important part of what we normally do on the right hand side," Nightingale said.
"So we've been working hard on trying to add some variation and take some predictability out of our play.
"The difference in a few of our games has been one play or one mistake.
"If we'd played the way we played last week against any other team we probably would have won."
For the Dragons to reignite their season, five-eighth
Jamie Soward must overcome a post-Origin slump.
Against the Storm nine days ago, Soward pushed as hard as possible to get involved, barking at teammates and chancing his hand on the big plays.
Unfortunately, they didn't come off.
The time to make things happen is fast running out for St George Illawarra.