Cronulla coach John Morris believes the Sharks are a far superior team than their seventh position on the NRL ladder suggests and now they get the chance to prove it.

The Sharks travel to Penrith on Friday night to take on Panthers outfit riding high atop the ladder following a club-record nine straight wins.

But despite Cronulla’s own finals spot seemingly assured, Morris wants the Sharks to validate their title credentials after a series of near misses against the competition heavyweights.

Had they not butchered a try at the death in the season opener against South Sydney, had Cameron Smith not slotted a late penalty goal for Melbourne in round two or had Shaun Johnson had his own kicking boots on against Parramatta two weeks ago, the Sharks would have been comfortably inside the top four.

Little wonder coach Morris wants to deliver a statement against the Panthers.

“It’s a huge game in the context of our season,” Morris said on Thursday.

“I don’t want to focus on the outcome too much but it would be nice to get a scalp. We still haven’t got one against a top-four team.

“But we’ve played really well against the likes of the Storm and Parramatta.

“So I take confidence out of that but we play four or five teams above us on the ladder in our run home so, for our own confidence and belief, it would be nice to knock off a team.”

To do so on Friday night, the Sharks must reverse a 56-24 hammering at the hands of Penrith in round nine.

“It wasn’t too long ago. They certainly did a job on us,” Morris said.

“We certainly need to reflect back on that. We missed our start that day. It was 26-0 after about as many minutes.

“A lot of errors coming out of our end, a lot of yardage penalties and I guess everything that could go wrong, did go wrong that today.

“So hopefully we’ll be smarting from that game, we’ll have learned our lessons and you’ll see a different team tomorrow night.”

Morris is confident Johnson, who leads the league for try assists in 2020, isn’t suffering any emotional hangover from his involvement in this week’s high-profile judiciary hearing after being bitten by New Zealand Test teammate Kevin Proctor.

“He’s okay. It’s been a big week for him but it’s good that it’s done and dusted and out of the way,” the coach said.

“Physically he’s in pretty good nick too.”

Johnson was replaced with a groin niggle against Gold Coast last Saturday but trained on Thursday and should be fit to tackle the Panthers.