NEWPORT Gwent Dragons may line up a friendly to fill the three-week gap in the schedule as they attempt to find their cutting edge, writes Chris Kirwan.

The Dragons limped to a 13-0 win against Zebre in the Guinness Pro12 last Friday and have to wait to get a frustrating display out of their system.

The start of the World Cup means they are not in competitive action until the first Saturday in October when they travel to Leinster.

However, they could attempt to repeat what they did last season by setting up encounters with other teams.

Last September they travelled to Farleigh House to train against Bath while in March they took on London Welsh in a behind-closed-doors conditioning game.

"If we can get a friendly organised it'd be great but every team is in the same position," said director of rugby Lyn Jones.

"If standards improve in training then they will improve on the pitch. The players are hard on themselves and we just need to get on with things."

The Dragons opened their season by fighting for a losing bonus point against Connacht in Galway but had to settle for four points from their clash against a Zebre side that had shipped 61 points at Cardiff Blues on opening weekend.

An Ed Jackson try from a driving lineout was all that the Dragons could muster on a miserable night in Newport.

"A lot of our approach work was excellent but it was quite easy to see that our finishing was shocking," said Jones.

"It was of a poor standards and if we had won 50-0 nobody would have blinked an eyelid, that's how dominant we were throughout the game.

"Zebre got stuffed against Cardiff Blues. They got a real pumping. In soccer terms they lost 7-0 and then came to put 11 fellas behind the ball.

"They came here for damage limitation and had we build up 20 points it would have meant that they had to play a little bit more but we didn't get the scoreboard moving.

"It was a frustrating night but we move on and forget about this as quickly as we can."