But after 12 straight defeats, they head to Brookvale Oval on Sunday to face Manly, who have a chance to consign their long-time rivals to an unwanted page in rugby league history.

Newcastle's worst-ever losing streak was in 2005, when they lost their first 13 games before a drought-breaking boilover at Penrith.

Eleven years down the track, the Knights will draw level with their hapless predecessors unless they stage one of the upsets of the season at Brookvale, where they have won only two of 17 games, and none since 2006. Instead of using this as a source of motivation, Newcastle's players would clearly rather not broach the subject.

Asked about the prospect of equalling the record, winger Nathan Ross replied: "That's the first I've heard of it, so it hasn't been spoken about. We're just going to worry about what we can do as individuals and collectively in order to get our next win. We've just got to play the game plan the coaches have given us."

Ross added he would prefer to avoid such a statistic: "Some records you do want, and that's definitely one you don't."

Knights prop Korbin Sims replied "not at all" when asked if the looming landmark had been a topic of conversation. "You never want to lose two games in a row, let alone 13 or whatever it's going to be," Sims said. "But we've been building to something good in the last couple of weeks. We had a minor hiccup [against Cronulla] on the weekend but, moving forward, we'll go down to Manly and try to spoil their party."

After Manly's 26-10 win against Newcastle in round eight, the Sea Eagles endured their own losing slump. But since the return from injury of playmakers Daly Cherry-Evans and Jamie Lyon, they have strung three wins together to give themselves an outside chance of making the play-offs.

Manly coach Trent Barrett said his players would not be underestimating the Knights. "The footage that we've watched of Newcastle this week, they took Melbourne down to  the wire, they were leading 16-zip after 20 minutes when they played Canberra, so they've been playing well," Barrett said.

"They're a big team and they've got some young, enthusiastic players in there. So we certainly won't be taking anybody lightly. We're not in a position to."

Barrett said Origin centre Dylan Walker, who has resumed training after being sidelined with a broken hand, was unlikely to play against the Knights.