Knights vow to hold the fort until Ponga returns from injury

Ponga underwent surgery in Sydney on Tuesday to repair a ruptured Lysfranc ligament in his right foot and is expected to spend at least 12 weeks recovering.

In the absence of the reigning Dally M medallist, the Knights, who are 15^th on the ladder after two wins from seven games, have been widely written off, drifting from $3.50 to $6 in the top-eight betting market.

But they are determined to prove they are no one-man team and believe they can compensate for the loss of Ponga's attacking brilliance by muscling up in defence, starting in Sunday's clash with the Dolphins at Suncorp Stadium.

"It's important that everybody continues to play their role and everyone lifts a little bit," Knights football director Peter Parr said.

"You can't replace a player like Kalyn.

"That's near-on impossible.

"But him being there, whether he's there or not, shouldn't stop players playing their role, making sure they're committed to the effort areas of the game, and making sure they do everything possible to win as many games as they can.

"We've still got a lot of confidence in the team. We're a squad, not a team."

Prop Jacob Saifiti said Ponga was a "massive loss" but the Knights were intent on rediscovering the "steely edge" they displayed defensively during their 10-game winning streak last season.

Newcastle were the fifth-best defensive team in the NRL last year, conceding an average of 18.8 points per game, which was overshadowed by the fact that they scored more regular-season tries than any other team.

This year they have been conceding 21.2 points per game, including a 36-12 loss loss to Canterbury last week.

"We won those games [last year] on the back of our defence," Saifiti said. "Although Kalyn sets our numbers up, it's the 12 in front of him that have to do our jobs.

"While we will miss him ... as the old saying goes, forwards decide who wins, backs decide by how much."

Saifiti added that "maybe we don't win 66-0 or 30-0, but I'm pretty sure we can still win games ... we talk about how good our attack was last year, but over those last 12 games, we had the best defence in the comp. That's what won us those games. We've sort of fallen away from that."

Parr was confident Ponga would play again this year.

"He's very positive about that ... hopefully our team can string enough wins together over the next few months so that they're in finals contention when he comes back," Parr said.

"If we are, what a bonus he'll be when he gets back."