PORT ADELAIDE forward Charlie Dixon has backed his side to be able to cover the absence of key defender Tom Jonas, who will miss at least a month with a knee injury.

Jonas limped off in the third quarter of Saturday evening’s win over St Kilda after hurting his left knee while being tackled.

He will undergo an arthroscopy in the next 24 hours to remove a floating loose body from his knee joint and be sidelined for four to six weeks.

At a press conference at Port Adelaide’s McDonald’s Junior Member Clinic at Alberton Oval on Monday, Dixon said there were numerous options to replace Jonas including Jack Hombsch, Trent McKenzie and Jarrod Lienert.

“He’ll be back for finals so nothing too serious,” Dixon said of Jonas.

“He is enormous, but he’s been in and out the last couple of weeks (with a hamstring complaint) so it might do him a bit of good to rest the rest of the body up.

“We’ve got some really good depth at the moment and Hombschy’s been great every time he’s come back and we've got Trent, who came back in the Maggies yesterday as well.

"We've got plenty of depth there and plenty of boys we can rotate through there."

Hombsch has been in and out of the side lately after playing six games in a row between Rounds 5 and 11.

The backman has been reliable but unlucky, playing two of the five games since.

“He’s still in unbelievable form, it’s just stiff depending on who we’ve got playing and how they are playing,” Dixon said of the 92-game 25-year-old.

“It’s not a bad thing, it’s unlucky for Homma but he’s ready to step in and take every opportunity he can.”

Dixon admitted his side didn’t play the way it wanted to for the whole game against the Saints, suggesting there was plenty to work on.

“We weren’t sort of at our best but we were still able to push and then get a few goals ahead,” he said.

“There’s some areas where we need to be able to keep tightening the screws and keep scoring and be able to run over teams where we haven’t been able to do that this year.

“We find a way to win hard but we’ve just got to keep moving forward.”

Dixon had his best return on the scoreboard of the season, slotting four goals.

He said he was enjoying playing a variety of roles this year and it didn’t necessarily mean kicking a lot of goals.

“I’ve got a lot of stuff to still work on,” he said.

“I’m still working on my craft and trying to get better at every aspect of my game.

“I’ve just got to do what the team asks of me – if that’s going in the ruck, I’ll go in the ruck, if it’s just crash packs bringing balls to the ground for the boys, that’s what I’ll do – and I was just lucky to get on the end of a couple on the weekend.”

After a game where both sides were poor in front of goal, Dixon admitted he’d previously changed his kicking routine to try and fix his goal-kicking.

He said he still wasn’t kicking as straight as he would like but it was something he and the team were working on.

“It’s all over the comp where players are struggling in front of goal,” Dixon said.

“All us boys we’re all working on our craft and trying to simulate in games because in training you’re never really as gassed as you are in a game and lining up in front of goal and having the 30 seconds to kick goes a lot quicker than you think.

“You’ve just got to be able to steady yourself in 30 seconds and go back and kick a goal but it’s a bit harder than you think.”

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