Knights coach Adam O’Brien has already begun planning Newcastle’s off-season rebuild, and is confident he will remain at the helm long enough to see it come to fruition.
One of the worst seasons in the club’s 35-year history ended at McDonald Jones Stadium on Sunday as the under-manned Knights stumbled to a 38-16 loss to finals-bound Cronulla.
It was Newcastle’s 10th loss at home – their only victories were against wooden-spooners Wests Tigers and 13th-placed Gold Coast – leaving a team that made the finals in 2020 and 2021 languishing in 14th position ahead of only the Warriors and Wests Tigers.
As has been the case for most of the season, the Knights were punished for their mistakes and lack of experience and expertise in key positions, which overshadowed a handful of highlights provided by try-scoring wingers Dominic Young and Edrick Lee.
“Probably that 80 minutes summed us up,” O’Brien said.
“There’s parts there where I was standing up in the box applauding, and everyone as a club could be proud of, then there were moments that you’d love to have again.
“But we’ll come back bigger and better. We’ll work hard over the summer, and we’ll come back here, and we’ll be bigger and better for it next year.”
Hoy with a sidestep Ponga would be proud of
Not even the presence of some of the club’s most celebrated former players on “Once A Knight” Old Boys’ Day could inspire something special from the current crop, though O’Brien pointed out they had “a red-hot crack” despite having as many as 15 first-graders unavailable.
“Every week we turn up here we want to put in a good performance, but we understand the importance of our Old Boys,” O’Brien said.
“They’re really supportive our Old Boys. They don’t get stuck into us, and we were hopeful of giving them a game that they could be proud of, and I reckon we won’t lose any of their support on the back of that one.”
After winning their first two games against the Roosters and Wests Tigers, Newcastle won just four of the next 22 to crash out of top-eight contention long before the final round.
In the middle stages of the season, they endured the worst home stretch in their history, outscored 197-28 in a string of humiliating losses to Manly (30-6), Parramatta (39-2), Melbourne (50-2), Brisbane (36-12) and Penrith (42-6).
Heavy defeats to the Rabbitohs (40-28) and Roosters (42-12) followed soon after, then came an insipid, ignominious 24-10 loss to the Bulldogs.
“Like I’ve said time and time again, we don’t want to turn up and put in those performances,” O’Brien said.
“We really appreciate all our members, our sponsors, our supporters that sit on that hill rain, hail or shine, and we don’t like letting them down.
“But it’s certainly something that we’ll need to drive us over the summer to make sure that we get this place to be a really hard place to come and get two points.
Unfortunately, this year that hasn’t been the case, but we’re not going to run away from the fight. We’re going to fix it.
Knights coach Adam O'Brien
“I don’t know if surprised is the right word, but we’re not happy where we ended up.
“There’s so many different parts to the season that we chunk together, and it’s hard to do it now or we’d be here for hours, but it’s something that we’ll sit down over the next few weeks and have a fairly good idea around what our summer’s going to look like compared to our last one.”
O’Brien is contracted until the end of 2024, having signed a two-year extension early last year, but has had to endure speculation about his future as the team’s form fell away this season.
He accepted that was an occupational hazard for any coach of a losing team but, rather than worry about that continuing into next season, he was focused on the start of pre-season training.
“We’re all invested. We’ve got some good people in the organisation,” he said.
“We’ve got great support from our owners in the Wests Group, the facilities, everything is there, we’ve just got to make a couple of key decisions, the right decisions around some personnel, get our summer right, get our pre-season right, and work our way out of it.
“Results will take pressure away.
“I’m looking at November 2 for the first group to come in, I just want to get that day right, and the middle of next year will take care of itself if I get November 2 right.”
