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# From Spoon to Silver - A Knight's Tale
- URL: https://leagonomics.com.au/from-spoon-to-silver-a-knights-tale/
- Published: 2026-10-25T23:45:13.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-29T03:22:15.000Z
- Author: The Team

The Newcastle Knights finished the 2025 NRL season in a mess. It wasn't a great year, full of controversy on and off the field. They finished with nine consecutive losses, being finally beaten by Parramatta in a 66-10 defeat that gifted them the Spoon. 

The collapse was complete, and while their coach Adam O’Brien’s exit had been confirmed two weeks earlier, it didn't reveal any kind of light at the tunnel. 

Fast forward a year, and somehow they made it to the Grand Final - playing the Roosters, ultimately going down by one solitary point. It was the club’s first grand final since 2001 and came after a turnaround for the ages.

How did they do it? What went so poorly in 2025? How did they turn it around, and go so agonisingly close to claiming the title? Leagonomics investigates - let's take a look at the numbers.

### **What went wrong in 2025**

The simplest answer is that the Knights couldn’t score. They averaged 14.1 points and 2.5 tries a game in 2025, both last in the competition. 

They were destined for the Spoon, being held to 12 points or fewer in 12 of their 24 games. You cannot win a season with two converted tries a week - in fact they only scored more than 30 points once.

The problem wasn’t effort with the ball. Newcastle ranked 3rd for tackle breaks and 6th for post-contact metres in the comp. They ran hard but just couldn't create anything with it. They were 13th for line breaks (4.2 a game) and 13th for line-break assists (3.5). They also converted breaks into tries at the lowest rate in the league: 0.60 tries per line break, against a league average of 0.83\. On top of that they made 12.2 errors a game, 16th in the NRL. 

Musical chairs in the halves combinations played a key role in the results. Six different players wore the 6 or 7 last season, and the coach, Adam O'Brien, never kept the same pairing together for more than four games in a row. Nothing had time to develop or click into place.

Kalyn Ponga, meanwhile, managed just 13 games due to injuries. Fletcher Sharpe also suffered critical injuries in round 16 and was out for the rest of the season. Other key players injured for multiple rounds include Bradman Best, Tyson Gamble and of course, Dylan Lucas.

### **The Collapse**

|                     | Games    | Wins | Pts against per game |
| ------------------- | -------- | ---- | -------------------- |
| With Ponga & Sharpe | First 15 | 6    | 18.8                 |
| Without them        | Final 9  | 0    | 39.6                 |

With the combination of Ponga and Sharpe both removed, the boat rapidly took on water. The chart below highlights the scores conceded after the two players were forced onto the sidelines. Most notably, the final 66 point smashing (Knights scored 10) by Parramatta where they were presented with the prize nobody wants... 

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/2d/b8/2db824a3-2eb5-4e76-84ba-74865e55e84d/content/images/2026/10/m_chart2_collapse-1-1.png)

Knights conceded on average 18.8 points a game in their first 15 games of 2025, then an average of 39.6 a game in the final 9 after Ponga and Sharpe were injured.

...Last.

Place.

Oh dear.

## **Redemption Road**

Two weeks into September 2025, the club appointed Justin Holbrook as Head Coach. A former Knights player, he understands what the team means to the town, and vice versa. His mission: Turn it around.

**Lock it in:** A major change was to lock in the halves combinations and let things develop. While the injuries didn't stop - Sharpe, Brown and Ponga were all hurt inside the first two rounds - the difference was that the Knights used four halves all year on a much more stable set of combinations. By the finals Sharpe and Smith had played eight straight games together.

**Making your Luck:** In 2025 the Knights’ forwards did their job, but couldn't make points appear. Newcastle ranked 3rd in the competition for tackle breaks, and this year they broke almost exactly as many tackles again (32.4 a game then, 32.9 now). 

The difference is what happened next. We broke down the poor line-break stats from 2025 previously. In 2026 the same go-forward has produced 6.3 line breaks a game (3rd) and 5.4 line-break assists (2nd), lifting them from the competition’s lowest-scoring side to its 6th-highest.

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/2d/b8/2db824a3-2eb5-4e76-84ba-74865e55e84d/content/images/2026/10/m_chart1_ranks.png)

Comparison of 2025 vs 2026 for the Knights on scoring, line break info, errors and metres conceded.

You can’t put this down to a league-wide rule change. The NRL average rose by less than a point a game, while the Knights went from 14.1 to 26.4\. What changed was who had the ball in their hands. 

The creative load was spread thin in 2025: no Knight managed more than 24 try and line-break assists, and the halfback Jack Cogger managed 13\. This season four players have passed 30: Ponga (39), Sandon Smith (35), Dane Gagai (35) and Bradman Best (32). 

A settled spine meant the right people were calling the shots, and they had the fullback back for 18 games instead of 13\. Out wide, Greg Marzhew (24 tries) and Dom Young (23) have been striking, which was a key factor in their success. 

### Still work to do

While these two are crossing the line, for all their efforts, the Knights still struggle as a team to get over. Rather than being clinical, pinpoint, they are peppering shots at the line and hoping they stick. It takes a lot of effort to repeatedly run at it and not land points, and that's the problem.

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/2d/b8/2db824a3-2eb5-4e76-84ba-74865e55e84d/content/images/2026/10/m_chart3_finishing-1.png)

Match data for 2026 regular season showing average line breaks per game, and average tries per line break. Note the difference between the Roosters and Knights. The Knights create more opportunity than most teams via line breaks, but convert much fewer of them into actual tries than most teams on average.

Volume did most of the work, not precision. If they finished like an average side, they’d add nearly two points a game.

### The Final Showdown

The chart above clearly shows the difference between the Knights and the Roosters, their Grand Final opponent. Amazingly, they pulled it together on the big stage and completed at a higher rate than their season average - doubling their tries per line break on average as shown below.

| Knights attack       | 2026 season avg | Grand final |
| -------------------- | --------------- | ----------- |
| Line breaks          | 6.3             | 2           |
| Tries per line break | 0.75            | 1.5         |
| Metres gained        | 1,560           | 1,333       |

While it's a good improvement and happened at the right time, the problem for the Knights is, that they simply didn't have the chance to get more of them - they just didn't get enough of the ball and spent too much time defending in their own end.

| Knights defence      | 2026 season avg | Grand final |
| -------------------- | --------------- | ----------- |
| Points conceded      | 24.6            | 19          |
| Line breaks conceded | 5.0             | 3           |
| Metres conceded      | 1,620           | 1,956       |
| Tackles made         | 354             | 434         |
| Missed tackles       | 31.4            | 38          |
| Ineffective tackles  | 14.4            | 20          |

By the end of the game the Knights were exhausted, but the Roosters kept coming. It's incredible that the Roosters only managed three tries with the possession and their attack, and the Knights defence was on point.

We said before the grand final that the result would come down to whether Newcastle could finish their chances. They did. Unfortunately there just weren't enough of them. A side that averaged six line breaks a game got two, and spent the night making 434 tackles while Tedesco ran for over 360 metres *(!!! Where do they get their energy? Must be all that Eastern Suburbs Sunshine and Sea Air).*

Even after all this, it was a lucky field goal from DCE that put the Roosters over and the Knights just couldn't get into position for an answering kick. After defending the onslaught, they didn't have it in the tank to get far enough downfield for it.

The closest, most heartbreaking of margins to go down by. But the redemption story is complete and 2027 should bring a solid season if this is anything to go by for the Newcastle boys.