KNIGHTMARE END TO WEEK OF CELEBRATION
AFTER almost a week of celebrations in the Hunter, the Ponga party was brought to a grinding halt by Parramatta, who handed Newcastle the biggest home loss of Adam O’Brien’s coaching tenure on Sunday.
On Wednesday, Kalyn Ponga put pen to paper on the most significant contract to pass across the Knights’ board table since 2016 when the club initially signed him.
The Knights were thrilled to have secured Ponga’s longterm future but it’s the immediate future that now desperately needs to be addressed.
With Sunday’s humiliating 39-2 loss, the Knights have slumped to their first fivegame losing streak since 2019 and risk falling further behind the pack if they can’t turn things around quick-smart.
The Knights lost Kalyn Ponga to a HIA in the first half and their attack struggled to click into gear, even when he came back on. Their defence was even worse.
Eager to make up for their shock loss to the Wests Tigers, the Eels didn’t need set-plays to score their six tries, only a bit of muscle and 17 play-the-balls in the Knights’ 20m zone. Ouch.
It was Parramatta that came into the match on the back foot, though.
Injury has ripped through the Eels’ outside back stocks since before the season began and the situation reached critical mass over the weekend.
Tom Opacic was a late withdrawal, forcing fiveeighth Dylan Brown to shift to left centre and Jakob Arthur to start in the halves.
Parramatta fans might’ve been raising their eyebrows but that was before the makeshift left edge produced the Eels’ first three tries.
Assisted by second-rower Shaun Lane, Brown had little trouble containing his opposite man, Origin player Dane Gagai, in defence.
In attack, the towering Lane had a hand in both firsthalf four-pointers. He first crashed over for a softer try than most you’ll see in first grade and then found an unmarked Hayze Perham with an offload.
Within five minutes of the restart, Brown had the Eels’ third try and the game had slipped away from Newcastle. An Isaiah Papali’i double rubbed salt into the wounds.
When the game was in the balance, the Knights didn’t do too much wrong in attack. They completed at 80 per cent in the first half but it will take more than adequacy to play September footy.
And with each loss, the odds are stacking higher and higher against the Novocastrians.
No Newcastle team has ever played finals after starting 2-4. The current outfit is 2-5 and faces the Melbourne Storm this week.