Star fullback Billy Slater says Melbourne Storm will reap the benefits generated by a week off.
The Storm earned the break thanks to an 18-8 win over Newcastle at AAMI Park last Sunday and now await the winner of Friday night's knockout semi-final between Wests Tigers and New Zealand.
Slater believes it is the ideal scenario for Melbourne, who are now just one step away from a fairytale grand final appearance.
"Certainly it's an advantage to freshen up and sharpen up on our play," Slater said.
"This week is about concentrating on ourselves, making sure our timing and fluency in attack is right, just working on the little things we need to work on to get our game right."
"Next week we'll obviously know the opposition we're playing and do a bit of homework on them."
Slater, who said he had no preference when quizzed on which side he would like to face in the preliminary final, admitted Storm weren't entirely happy with their winning performance over Newcastle.
"I thought we did let the Knights back in towards the back-end of the game," Slater said.
"That's one area we need to fix up, we've got to concentrate on playing all 80 minutes, there's no point playing the first 50 if you slacken off the last 30."
The 28-year-old, renowned as one of rugby league's finest big game players, was impressed by the composure shown by Storm's rising stars such as Gareth Widdop, Matt Duffie, Jesse Bromwich and Kevin Proctor in their first NRL final.
"The young guys we have are pretty mature kids," Slater said.
"I'm sure if they were feeling any pressure they wouldn't hesitate to come up and talk to us (experienced guys), but they handled it well."
Slater acknowledged the playing group is well-aware coach Craig Bellamy has a testing session planned later in the week in lieu of no game.
"We've been in this situation before and we need to have a bit of a hit out on the weekend," Slater said.
"Obviously we'll try to keep the injuries out of it, but also make sure the body feels like it's gone through a bit of a tough session, a game simulation sort of thing."