A weary St George Illawarra will go into next weekend's bye glad for the break after holding on for a 22-20 win over the Warriors at a wet and windy Mt Smart Stadium on Sunday.

Centre Matt Cooper was instrumental in the win, scoring two tries to get his tally up to 99 for the club, one behind all time try-scorer Nathan Blacklock.

Despite an improved performance after last week's 50-6 loss to Wests Tigers, the Warriors didn't have enough in the tank to finish off the Dragons and also had to endure yet another injury blow with centre Brent Tate sustaining a broken jaw.

Tate will be out of action for four to six weeks, missing the chance of a call-up for State of Origin II and putting Wests Tigers flyer Lote Tuqiri in the box seat for his first interstate rugby league game in eight years.

Dragons coach Wayne Bennett admitted his players were starting to feel the workload.

"I'm elated with this, we've been going 13 weeks straight without a break and we've played a lot of good football," Bennett said.

"Today wasn't our prettiest effort, but we're tired and we're looking for the break.

"They're courageous the Dragons and they have been all season. No other team in the comp has gone 13 weeks straight and we've been consistently winning as well, it's not as though we've been playing well below our best.

"That makes you feel good as a coach, knowing that you can mentally get through all of those things.

"We're 10 and 3, that's at the high end of the optimism I can tell you."

After the towelling by the Tigers last weekend, Warriors coach Ivan Cleary was proud of the way his side pushed the Dragons.

"I thought they were great today, they tried as hard as they could," he said.

"Against a side running first there was absolutely nothing wrong with the effort, I thought it was great.

"We probably did enough for them to be sitting in there (the changing room), feeling like they could have definitely won the game."

But the Tate injury, following so many to other key players, was a hard pill for Cleary to swallow.

"We've just got to hope for the best, that it's not too bad," he said, having gone into the game without the services of chief playmaker Brett Seymour and props Steve Price, Sam Rapira and Jacob Lillyman.

An upset win for the Warriors looked on the cards early with James Maloney scoring the opening try, scooping on a dropped ball by Ben Creagh after he clashed heads with Tate in the third minute.

Tate was spitting blood after the collision and left for hospital ten minutes later.

Maloney took the score to 8-0 with a penalty in the 31st minute, but a minute before the break the Dragons finally woke from their slumber with Jason Nightingale diving to catch a perfect kick from Jamie Soward to score.

Soward's conversion made it 8-6 at half time.

Cooper scored in the 44th minute, but the Warriors were able to strike back quickly with Simon Mannering latching on to a cross field kick from Isaac John.

He got his second try in the 54th minute, although a pass from Soward to Morris earlier in the move was clearly forward, but there was no controversy in the Dragons' next try as Soward breezed through shambolic defence.

Isaac John ran 40 metres to score his first try for the Warriors with 17 minutes to go, but the home side bombed a few chances late in the game to snatch a win against the league's table toppers.

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