Thanks to the NRL's McIntyre finals system, Nathan Fien was a lost soul on Saturday morning.

The St George Illawarra hooker didn't know what to do with himself, his season in the hands of his NRL rivals.

Of course the Dragons put themselves in that situation by losing to Wests Tigers on Friday night, but that didn't help tick down the hours as they waited on other results to determine whether they had a future this year.

Brisbane and Manly won on Saturday to put them out of misery - but it could have extended through to Sunday's Melbourne-Newcastle clash had one of those sides been defeated.

"I was walking around a little bit lost Saturday morning - I didn't know what to do," Fien said following Monday's training session.

"I've never been in that spot before. A few of the boys have been through it (in 2004) where they've come out the other side and been bundled out so (it was) a lot better feeling around the place this morning.

"Saturday night we just got the text message off our football manager saying what time training was - we just had to get our heads around it."

For prop Jon Green the wait was even more torturous given he, like coach Wayne Bennett and fullback Darius Boyd - both of whom are heading to Newcastle next season - and retiring centre Mark Gasnier, didn't know if they had played their last game for the Dragons.

Green is off to Cronulla on a two-year deal in 2012.

"We didn't know what to expect after Friday night," Green said.

"I heard a couple of people on the radio say that the team that finishes fifth rarely goes on the (following) week once they've lost so we didn't know what to expect.

"Obviously we're pretty lucky to be here."

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