Newcastle enter the rescheduled match, to be played behind closed doors at Netstrata Jubilee Stadium in Kogarah, needing only a draw to go ahead of Melbourne Victory on goal difference and avoid the wooden spoon.

The delayed finale to Newcastle's poor campaign comes a week after Deans announced he was stepping aside with a season to run on his contract and as the Jets work to rebuild their squad.

Hoffman, 32, is among the contracted players for next season and he hopes Deans remains involved at the club.

Deans said he and the club had spoken about him taking up a different role next season but that has yet to be announced.

"Craig's obviously someone who I've known for a long time, being around Newcastle, the football club in general," Hoffman said.

"Obviously to see him stepping away at the end of the season, away from the first team as a head coach, is disappointing, but hopefully he remains involved at the club and hopefully he can influence the club going forward in some capacity.

"But that's obviously for our owners to decide and the people in charge.

"But as an experienced player at the club, it's about just finishing the season right and doing the right thing by Deansy and the rest of the squad, and the board who's put faith in the club to prop us up, so we've got a huge game or two left at the moment under Craig and then we build for an exciting future."

Deans has also spoken about taking a winning mentality into the final game and Hoffman said it was the only approach.

"It's a scary mindset to sort of trick yourself into saying we need a draw, because then you may at best only get a draw," he said.

"For us, we need to focus on us, not worry about Melbourne City. We have a huge match where we need to get three points. That has to be the goal and that will obviously put us in the best possible mindset to play well and get the result we need.

"Obviously a draw is all we need, but I think if you focus on that, you may only hit that as the best option.

"We need to aim for the top and that's three points.

"We desperately want to at least finish 11^th so we can, one, avoid the wooden spoon, and obviously that gives us a kinder draw for the FFA Cup qualifying match."

The Jets will be without Valentino Yuel, who left this week to play for South Sudan against Jordan on June 21. Yuel will return in July.