St George Illawarra slipped to back-to-back defeats after they were overpowered by Cronulla in the local derby.
The Dragons had established an 18-6 lead at the break in enemy territory but simply had no answers for the Sharks’ power in the second stanza as they leaked 24 unanswered points.
The loss continued a worrying defensive run for the Red V, who were battered 56-6 by the Dolphins in their previous fixture.
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Shane Flanagan bristles at ref call as Sharks run down the Dragons
Shane Flanagan would have been demanding a response from his side after their horror loss to the Phins.
Yet things looked bleak early on at Shark Park as Craig Fitzgibbon’s outfit, who were trying to arrest their own recent poor form, came flying out of the blocks.
Braydon Trindall scored the first try after just nine minutes and alarm bells surely would have been ringing loudly inside Flanagan’s head.
However, the Dragons wrestled momentum back and crossed for three tries in a 15-minute spell to leave the Sharks searching for answers.
The home side certainly found them though in the second period, with Sione Katoa, Jesse Ramien, Sifa Talakai and Ronaldo Mulitalo churning through the metres alongside Addin Fonua-Blake through the middle.
The backline stars were constantly picking up possession well out of trouble as the Dragons were pinned into their own half for much of the second stanza.
"It was a mirror of the first half but just in different colour jerseys," Flanagan said.
"They ran a little bit harder, got good field position and all their kicks were contestable. They ended up on our 20 or 30-metre line and never had to kick out of yardage."
Kicking proved to be the main theme of the night with Trindall and Nicho Hynes bombarding an out-of-sorts Tyrell Sloan and Nathan Lawson to generate multiple four-pointers.
Lyhkan King-Togia then went in search of a chip-and-chase effort in the closing stages, only for Katoa to reel the ball in and race away to seal the result.
Although it was a controversial late penalty from a kick-off that annoyed Flanagan the most.
The coach was left riled up by Grant Atkins’ call that the ball had failed to travel the required distance before Moses Suli gained possession.
"There were some decisions I was amazed at," the coach stated.
"You were watching it, weren’t you?" Flanagan replied when asked what decision, in particular, he was unhappy with.
"There’s a kick-off that you should watch again. There’s a red line there that’s called the 40-metre line and Suli was on the other side of that [when he touched the ball]."