The Dragons season is on life support after their tepid defeat to the Raiders at WIN Stadium, with the team now required to win at least six of their last eight to play finals football.

Criticism of McGregor was swift and fierce in the aftermath of Sunday's defeat, with many fans calling for the coach's sacking.

Sims, however, backed the mentor to turn the ship around and lead a talented roster on a lengthy winning run.

"Our fans are very, very vocal and we love them more than anything, that's what keeps the club going," Sims said.

"But I think it's pretty harsh for them calling for Mary, because at the end of the day, he's just orchestrating us, he's not the one out there missing tackles and dropping balls.

"We need to do it for our fans, ourselves and our coach as well."

But the task doesn't get any easier for Sims and his team this Friday when they travel to Penrith to face the Panthers.

"It's starting to get to the point where it's no longer pussy-footing around each other and sugar coating it," Sims said.

"We've got the talent there, we've got the people that can do the job and have done the job in the past, but we're just lacking the intent at the moment.

"We need to change that around as quick as we can because we need to win six out of eight, it's crunch time.

"We don't want to be getting to the end of the season sitting on our hands and hoping for other teams to lose, because that's an uncontrollable.

"We want to control what we can do and that's the way that we prepare for Penrith this weekend."