The whispers and words spoken outside Newcastle’s inner circle suggest the Knights are not expected to win without talismanic captain Kalyn Ponga and star recruit Dylan Brown.
Jacob Saifiti has not been listening.
He is too busy leading.
And on Sunday, the former NSW front-rower led the Knights to a comprehensive 32-12 victory over 2025 minor premiers Canberra in front of a sell-out crowd of 23,002 at McDonald Jones Stadium.
Stretching back 304 days to a 26-22 extra-time victory over Manly on June 5 last year, the Knights ended a seven-game losing streak on home soil to move to second spot behind unbeaten leaders Penrith.
Backing up his brutal performance in Newcastle’s 24-16 win against Canterbury at Homebush eight days earlier, Saifiti ran 19 times for 174 metres against the Raiders and made 31 tackles in a dominant 65 minutes in the middle.
Without Ponga and Brown, Newcastle have now beaten two of the top four teams from last season in consecutive weeks, and Holbrook believes the leadership of senior players like Saifiti, Tyson Frizell and Dane Gagai have helped make that possible.
“Jacob had a great pre-season, he really bought into the change to the pace of the game, and he’s handling it, and he’s dominating it,” Holbrook told marvelbet365.com. “He’s really leading our side by example, and the boys are following him.”
Saifiti has endured more than his share of struggles in his past 10 seasons in Newcastle, including wooden spoons in his first two NRL campaigns (2016-17) and another last year, but has embraced the changes Holbrook has made since taking the reins last November.
Young at his best
“We’re a completely different side. Our head coach and our assistant coaches are all new, we’ve got new performance staff, and obviously some new players,” Saifiti told marvelbet365.com.
“Our biggest strengths this year are how connected we are as a group and the belief we have in the systems that Justin’s put in place.
“The buy-in from the players and the club has been unreal, and we’re reaping the rewards now. It’s still a long season, it’s only round five, but there’s some good signs there.”
Brown is expected back from a knee injury in two weeks and Ponga (hamstring) is on track to follow two weeks later.
Winning without them has helped build morale, Saifiti said, but he warned the Knights could not afford to drop their intensity when their star team-mates return.
“It’s massive for our confidence. When they come back, obviously they’re not going to make our team worse, they’re going to make us better,” Saifiti said.
Match: Wests Tigers v Knights
Round 6 -
home Team
Wests Tigers
5th Position
away Team
Knights
2nd Position
Venue: Campbelltown Sports Stadium, Sydney
Match broadcasters:
- WatchNRL
“But what happens is, you get those players back, the shoulders relax and you think you don’t have to work as hard doing your job. So when they come back, we have to maintain that hunger and desire, then who knows what can happen this year.”
Frizell, who also acknowledged the efforts of emerging team leaders like Phoenix Crossland and Mat Croker, said the Knights had “simplified our game and played to our strengths”.
“Everyone’s chipping in right across the board, and some of our leaders that are still in the side are playing well,” Frizell said.
“Players like Jacob, ‘Crokes’ is doing a great job through the middle there, Phoenix is playing busted, and ‘Gags’ was unreal today out on the edge.
“Collectively, as a group, we’re all chipping in, and it’s not just one single person that’s leading the way. Everyone’s doing their job and it’s making things a lot easier.”
Saifiti said the Knights were more disciplined than the Raiders, which went a long way towards them posting their fourth win from five starts this season.
He praised the selflessness of fellow leaders, such as Frizell, for helping him take advantage of a productive pre-season and making a solid start to his 11th NRL season in Newcastle.
“‘Friz’ has been enormous for us off the bench,” Saifiti said. “Someone like him probably should be starting, but he said to ‘Coach’ in round one, I’ll happily come off the bench, which says a lot about him.
“Gags is 35 this year and you saw what he did tonight, then you’ve got emerging leaders like Bradman, Crokes, Phoenix, Dylan Lucas, all stepping up and doing their job, and that makes my job as a leader so much easier.
“I’m happy with my start to the year, and I’m building off last year. I missed a lot of footy, and as a club we didn’t go too well, but I thought the games I did play in, I was pretty strong, then I had a big pre-season and carried that into this season.”
