{"id":399000,"date":"2026-01-08T04:39:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T04:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/399000\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T04:39:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T04:39:09","slug":"nrl-news-kalyn-ponga-issues-major-update-in-big-boost-for-knights-ahead-of-historic-clash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/399000\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL news: Kalyn Ponga issues major update in big boost for Knights ahead of historic clash"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kalyn Ponga<\/a> says he’s “confident” of returning to fitness in time for the Knights’ historic NRL<\/a> showdown against North Queensland in Las Vegas. The Newcastle skipper suffered a Lisfranc foot injury in round 17 that sidelined him for the remainder of the 2025 season<\/a> as Newcastle lost their last eight games to claim the wooden spoon.<\/p>\n

But Ponga has recently removed the protective moon boot he’d been wearing for months and says he’s “comfortable” with where his recovery is at. The 27-year-old has resumed light running duties but is yet to make his full return to pre-season training with the Newcastle squad ahead of the club’s first game in the United States on March 1 (Aussie time).<\/p>\n

\"Seen<\/p>\n

Knights captain Kalyn Ponga has provided an encouraging update on his injury recovery and prospects of playing in the NRL season opener in Las Vegas. Pic: Getty<\/p>\n

\u201cThe foot feels pretty good, things are rolling along well which is exciting and I\u2019m keen to get back out there,\u201d Ponga told media at a Knights club day this week. \u201cI think we did the right thing by backing off a little bit, we\u2019d rather get it right now than have more troubles during the season and miss games.”<\/p>\n

Ponga and the Knights are taking a deliberately cautious approach to the return from his latest foot injury. But the Newcastle captain is desperate to play in Vegas and believes he’s on track to return to action for a pre-season trial game before the squad flies out to the USA in late February.<\/p>\n

Kalyn Ponga confident of playing in Vegas for Knights<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve still got eight weeks until Vegas and every day I will do my best to tick every box and try to tick a few more,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m very comfortable with where I\u2019m at, I\u2019m very confident of taking the field in Vegas, I\u2019m doing everything I can to get it right…<\/p>\n

\u201c(I was doing) a lot of upper body weights and upper body conditioning (in the moon boot), but I\u2019m running now and trying to get as fit as I can\u2014I\u2019m definitely happy I\u2019m out of the boot. The way the rehab is coming along I am definitely hopeful of playing in a trial game (before Vegas).\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Pictured<\/p>\n

Kalyn Ponga is confident of returning from injury in time for a pre-season trial before the Knights fly to Vegas to take on the Cowboys to start the NRL season. Pic: Getty<\/p>\n

The news will come as music to the ears of Newcastle fans, who already have cause to be optimistic ahead of the new season. The Knights have appointed Justin Holbrook as their new head coach and have brought in a number of key recruits, including mega-money signing Dylan Brown from the Eels.<\/p>\n

Brown claimed three-straight man of the match awards to help New Zealand win the Pacific Championship title last year. And while Ponga hasn’t been able to work on his combinations with Brown as yet, he loves what he’s seen from the playmaker in pre-season so far.<\/p>\n

“Yeah I haven’t been out on the field which is unfortunate but the conversations we’re having, watching video on him has been quite enjoyable. He’s class, you can tell he’s a classy player and you can see why we’ve signed him and why he’s here and I’m excited to work with him for sure.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kalyn Ponga says he’s “confident” of returning to fitness in time for the Knights’ historic NRL showdown against…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":399001,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,3762,2623,212431,761,762,158,212432,85,101147],"class_list":["post-399000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-kalyn-ponga","tag-las-vegas","tag-lisfranc-foot-injury","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-nrl-season","tag-sports","tag-the-knights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=399000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/399001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=399000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=399000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=399000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}