Newcastle will adopt a revolutionary captaincy rotation model in season 2021.
The Knights on Tuesday night announced that Daniel Saifiti and Jayden Brailey would co-captain the club in next Friday night's season-opening clash against the Bulldogs.
However, fellow leadership group members Kalyn Ponga, Blake Green and Mitch Barnett will also be tasked with the captaincy throughout different stages of the season.
But with Ponga and Green sidelined for around a month, the other three players will rotate the responsibilities for the interim.
Knights coach Adam O'Brien announced the decision during an on-stage interview with Fox Sports host Yvonne Sampson during the club's official season launch at NEX.
“I’ll rotate it around as I see,” Newcastle coach Adam O’Brien said, per the Daily Telegraph.
“It freshen guys up. It’s a big responsibility being captain of the Newcastle team. It’ll be more of a feel thing for me regarding who will lead the team out each week.
“Running a model like this, we won’t be sitting here in two or three years time talking about lack of leadership. We could have a stand alone captain later in the year or next year. I’ll make that decision.”
O'Brien confirmed that Green would assume most on-field responsibilities for the upcoming season.
It comes after Mitchell Pearce stood down as skipper following a tumultuous off-season where he was involved in a sexting scandal with a club employee that caused his wedding to be cancelled.
Saifiti will lead the club out next Friday night in his 100th NRL match.
“Daniel is that alpha male – he has the emotion that’s attached to leading,” O’Brien said
“Jayden is very calm and tactical. He doesn’t get too emotional. It’s a really good yin and yang model. We can get the details in that the team needs through Jayden but we can get the emotion and reaction through Daniel.”
The Knights host Canterbury at McDonald Jones Stadium next Friday night, with kick-off at 6pm (AEDT).
