South Sydney coach Wayne Bennett has revealed prop Liam Knight will be sidelined indefinitely while he suffers ongoing headaches stemming from an NRL pre-season concussion.
Knight has been a regular around Rabbitohs training but on Thursday Bennett revealed the 26-year-old’s return to the field has been delayed due to ongoing symptoms.
It’s a concern for the club and Knight, who has not played at all this season.
“He keeps getting mild headaches and things at the moment, he won’t be available this week and I don’t think he’ll be available next week so we’re not sure how far he is away,” Bennett said.
“We thought he’d be back a couple of weeks ago but he keeps getting headaches consistently.
“It is frustrating but he’s handling that.”
It comes days after the NRL announced plans to introduce an 18th man to ease the stress on a team if they have three players fail a HIA during a game.
Bennett said while he is happy the NRL has recognised the in-game issue, he doesn’t believe it has been properly addressed just yet.
“I’m pleased with what the game did the other day in terms of recognising it. (Strict concussion protocols have) changed the game dramatically,” he said.
“Players now are going off with a HIA situation, most of them aren’t coming back.
“It’s a part of what we do unfortunately, there will be those collisions, there will be those moments but I’m pleased with how they’ve handled it.
“I don’t think it’s properly addressed yet, there’s more we have to do but that’s for another day, another decision.”
Bennett stopped short of expressing any specific changes to managing concussions on game day that he’d like to see.
Meanwhile, the Rabbitohs were fresh at training on Thursdayin preparation of their Good Friday clash with Canterbury at Stadium Australia.
Sprits are high after their 26-16 win over arch rivals Sydney Roosters last week but any thoughts of complacency will need to be wiped against the Bulldogs.
Canterbury have been held scoreless for two weeks in a row in losses to Penrith and Brisbane and have scored the fewest points of any side after three games this season.
“Whether you’re playing top teams or teams that might be struggling a little bit, you’ve got to turn up and do the job otherwise you put yourself under a fair bit of pressure,” Bennett said.
“It probably cost us here in the last couple of years a game that we should have won against teams that are down the bottom of the competition.”