Mudgee has suffered consecutive defeats to Orange Hawks and St Pat's, uncharacteristic from its strong start to the season.

There was a number of absentees in the Dragons loss to the Saints last round, but from Dwyer's understanding, Mudgee should be back to almost full strength, bar the absence of star playmaker and captain-coach Jack Littlejohn.

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"The past two weeks haven't probably been the true form of what we expect from Mudgee," he said.

"I do understand they had about eight out last week against St Pat's. They lost Jack Littlejohn during the game too with injury.

"They've got a number of players back this week, except for Littlejohn, so I'm sure they'll be up and ready for the big game."

Dwyer said the undefeated squad has been preparing well for the grand final rematch, which will be played at Carrington Park.

"The preparation has been really good. It's been a little bit difficult this year without playing every week but we're fortunate that we had a good hit-out against Workies last weekend," he said.

"It was a pretty good performance and I'm pretty sure the boys are looking forward to the match against Mudgee, it being a grand final rematch from the 2019 decider."

Dwyer said having more week-offs then in previous season has affected the way the club prepares for matches.

"It's just about how you manage things and Dougey [Panthers coach Doug Hewitt] is doing a great job, having things tick over well," he said.

"You don't want to have the training at a high intensity when you're not playing every week. Some weeks, the boys have been doing basic training when there's no games and then having a high intensity session during the week of the game.

"We just need to try and have everyone on the same page and not training too hard in the weeks we aren't playing."

Panthers have won all five games this season, scoring 248 points in the process and conceding just 26 points.

Play starts at 10.30am in the 18s league tag, followed by men's under 18s at 11.30am, first division at 12.30pm, league tag at 2pm and premier league at 3pm.

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