Bad habits die hard and for Cronulla coach Shane Flanagan the writing was on the wall on Saturday night that he has little time to turn it around.
In less than two weeks the Sharks travel to Canberra to tackle the Raiders in the first round of the NRL.
A less than impressive performance against Newcastle, a 32-10 loss, at Olympic Park in Muswellbrook had Flanagan scratching his head for answers.
"I'd have to think long and deep to find any positives," Flanagan said. "We just turned over the ball too much, fell back into some real bad old habits.
"Dropping the ball coming out of our own end and they punished us."
And the pain could continue with backrower Jeremy Smith placed on report for tripping in the 49th minute.
"In the second half we just got worse and worse," Flanagan said.
"All that stuff is fixable, it was dropping the ball in contact and bad passes.
"But it needs to be fixed real quick. I'm under no illusion there's a lot of work to do.
"Jeremy (Smith) is on report which is not very good."
