With a mounting injury toll to overcome, Newcastle winger James McManus says the Knights will need to come up with something special if they're to keep their NRL finals hopes alive.

In Sunday's 32-10 crushing by Manly, the Knights lost Wes Naiqama to a partially-torn tricep, while Junior Sa'u was transported from the field in a neck brace and was taken for scans on his shoulder and neck region.

There is an anxious wait to see what the diagnosis is on those key players during the week, and skipper Kurt Gidley is no certainty of returning from a hamstring injury either.

Adam MacDougall is likely to come back into the side to help alleviate the backline crisis, but the Knights' inept performances against Manly and North Queensland in the past two weeks suggest the team's troubles go deeper than a shortage of troops.

Newcastle find themselves outside the top eight, on for and against, and their dog-fight for a playoff berth starts this week against one of their direct competitors, Cronulla.

McManus is playing through painful damage to his rib cartilage, and says his team must dig deep against the Sharks at Toyota Stadium if they're to get their season back on track.

"I guess there's going to be certain players in our team who are going to have to lift if we're going to have a few blokes out, so we'll have to come up with something special," said McManus.

"We've got a short-term turnaround and Cronulla is going to be a hard game down there. They're going well at the moment."

McManus says the Knights have no one to blame but themselves for their alarming form slump, and he believes patience with the ball is the key to a turnaround.

The Knights have looked flat and optionless in attack in the past two weeks and, according to McManus, his team can't afford to panic and continue turning the ball over.

"We're doing it to ourselves. We're beating ourselves," he said.

"In the NRL sometimes, you've just got to take your medicine (and don't pass) and we're just not doing that at the moment and it's frustrating. We're playing a little bit too frantic."

One positive the Knights can find in their predicament is that injuries have been a burden all season long - and they've managed to find wins despite being without key players like Gidley, Jarrod Mullen, Isaac De Gois and Neville Costigan for extended periods.

McManus is confident the Knights have the depth to keep fighting.

"We recruited well in the off-season and we've got a pretty decent depth in the squad so we'll regroup and see if we can come up with a formulated game plan and whoever is out there will do a job for the Knights," he said.

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