Maestro Cameron Munster has moved to reassure Melbourne fans their title ambitions remain firmly on track despite some poor form heading into the NRL finals.
Munster expects his team to be written off as title favourites after conceding 70 points in their last two games and losing their superstar halfback Jahrome Hughes to injury ahead of their premiership tilt.
But Munster doesn't share the same concerns and believes their recent results ahead of Friday night's qualifying final at AAMI Park might work in their favour.
The second-placed Storm host third-ranked Canterbury, who were also below par in their last-round loss to Cronulla.
"A lot of people in the media or a lot of people around the footy community are probably going to be like put a line through us because of how bad we've been going the last couple of weeks," Munster said.
"But at the same time, it's probably a good thing for us - we go underneath the radar of everyone else and no one expects us to win."
The 30-year-old, who has played in 26 finals matches since 2015, said his team didn't need outside motivation from critics as they chase consecutive grand-final appearances.
"There's nothing more motivating than winning this game this Friday, being 80 minutes away from a prelim," he said.
The five-eighth put his team's lacklustre form down to the fact they had little to play for over the past two rounds, with their top-two spot already locked away.
"We've had two bad weeks but we've been pretty consistent this year," the 30-year-old said.
"I know it hasn't been ideal for Storm fans, it's been pretty disappointing, but we see it as probably not complacency, but it wasn't going to change a whole heap for us.
"The teams we were playing against were playing for their season ... but we need to be better in certain areas."
One area the Queensland Origin captain identified where Melbourne needed to improve was their back-end of matches.
In their last clash with the Bulldogs, in round 25 last month, the Storm let a 12-point halftime lead slip and were lucky to escape with a 20-14 victory with the visitors denied at the bell.
"I think the last couple of times we've played against some quality outfits in the top eight, we haven't played great in the back end of the game," Munster said.
"For some reason we find a way to shoot ourselves in the foot or want to invite the other team back, whether that's with piggybacks through penalties or errors, and we can't afford to be giving the ball away like we have been in the last couple of months."
"We have to make sure we obviously ice those moments on Friday because if we don't, it's going to be a disappointing result."
He said shutting down Bulldogs captain Stephen Crichton was key.
"If we can nullify Stephen Crichton's time and space and put a real emphasis on his game, I think it will go a long way to obviously getting the result we want."