The nib Newcastle Knights Head Coach, Adam O'Brien and Captain, Kalyn Ponga, spoke to the media following the 37-point loss to the Parramatta Eels.
The Eels scored an unanswered 39 points after the Knights took an early lead through a penalty goal.
The result is the Knights fifth loss on the bounce and the Coach and Captain addressed the performance.
ON THE PERFORMANCE
"Sorry. There wasn't much to be proud of," O'Brien said.
"There were parts of our game in the first half where I thought we stuck really well. I thought we attacked well last week, I thought we were awful today with the ball.
"We're in a bit of a rut at the moment.
"We got to stick together really tight fight our way hard out of this.
"It's not the sort of performance we want to put in defensively anywhere, let alone in front of 25,000 watching us."
PONGA ON GOING OFF FOR HIA
"It's happened a couple of times now, but there is a process that has to be done," Ponga said.
"You can't fault doctors for being cautious of head knocks.
"Obviously I want to stay on the field for as long as I can, but that is the process that we have.
AOB ON INJURY TOLL
"It makes it hard to put any section pressure on the team," O'Brien said.
"The injury toll had no excuse, no bearing on some of those efforts out there.
"We need a much better performance than that, regardless of injury.
"We don't have a lot of depth there, especially in the back-row stocks.
"I think Brodie (Jones) will miss next week as he has an hyper-extended elbow.
LOOKING AHEAD TO MELBOURNE CLASH
"I'd like to think we don't lack motivation for us to want to turn up here. We don't want to repeat that performance," O'Brien said.
"I know there is enough care in us to not want to do that to the 25,000 fans and our whole region.
"We'll pick ourselves up tomorrow and find a way."
