Former St Mary's Maitland student Jock Madden will line up at halfback for the Wests Tigers at Campbelltown on Sunday.

Madden, a Knights junior, came in last week to replace the injured Luke Brooks, scoring a try in the Tigers' 32-18 win over Brisbane.

With Brooks out for an extended period and Jackson Hastings now out injured too, the 22-year-old looks set to play out the year alongside five-eighth Adam Doueihi.

It will be a bit of an audition for Madden given he is off-contract at season's end.

"You can think of it like that," Madden said this week.

"But I'm just taking it week by week, and this week purely focused on the Knights."

With Tigers supremo Tim Sheens expressing a desire to now retain Brooks, despite the on-again, off-again speculation that the Knights want to pick up the maligned playmaker, it appears Madden's future is likely to be elsewhere.

It's an ironic situation given he left the Knights to join the Tigers in 2018 after receiving an offer too good to refuse out of high school.

After a few years in the lower grades, Madden made his NRL debut at Wests last season and will on Sunday play his 12^th NRL game.

He is one of a host of former Knights juniors or players from the Hunter now plying their trade elsewhere.

This season alone, Newcastle's NSW Cup player of the year in 2021, Zac Hosking, debuted for the Brisbane Broncos after failing to land a full-time contract with the Knights.

Swansea product Grant Anderson also made his debut for Melbourne Storm, earning his start from the Queensland Cup.

Singleton junior Josh King has gone on to play all 19 games for the Storm, while Bulldogs winger Jacob Kiraz was with the Knights last year but let go in the preseason.

Asked why there are so many ex-Knights or Hunter juniors at other clubs, Madden said he could only speak about his own move south.

"I have no idea why," Madden, the cousin of former Knights hooker Adam Clysdale, said.

"When I signed down here with the Tigers I thought it was a really good experience for me to learn under Benji, Robbie Farah, Josh Reynolds - a lot of experienced players here that had played at the highest level.

"I just thought it was a good opportunity to grow my game."

After sacking Michael Maguire, the Tigers have improved out of sight in recent weeks.

Prior to their win over Brisbane, they lost to the Cowboys, Panthers and Eels by a combined deficit of only 11 points.

Madden attributed their form turnaround to the influence of interim Tigers coach Brett Kimmorley, a former Hunter boy himself.

"For myself, he is a half ... so learning from him - he played at the highest level and 300-plus games," Madden said.

"He is clear to us players as well. He is a very smart man and he does pick the game apart from us."

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