Widdop dislocated his right shoulder for the third time in eight months in St George Illawarra's one-point victory over the Broncos last Thursday night, with scans on Monday confirming he would need a second shoulder reconstruction. 

Widdop underwent a latarjet procedure on Monday night and St George Illawarra head of athletic performance Nathan Pickworth said the expected recovery time is four to five months. 

"Typically the recovery from these is about four to five months," Pickworth said. "From this stage, I think it's a bit too early to give a specific return to play time frame for Gareth, but I'm pretty optimistic that Gareth hasn't played the last game for the Dragons."

Coach Paul McGregor has made just one change to the team that beat Brisbane, with Matt Dufty replacing Widdop as fullback for Sunday night's clash with Newcastle.

With doctors previously carrying out an open reconstruction on Widdop last September, it was determined the more intensive latarjet would be carried out this time. 

With a failure rate of about two per cent, it is hoped this is the last of Widdop's shoulder injuries. 

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"He had a procedure that's called a latarjet reconstruction, so what happens there, they take a piece of bone from elsewhere in his body and they move it into his shoulder to make the socket deeper in the ball and socket joint.

"This is a really stable shoulder reconstruction, they only have about a two per cent failure rate. He's pulled up really well from that, we spoke to the surgeon late last night and the surgeon's really happy with how the procedure went."

Pickworth also provided an update on Tyson Frizell, who suffered a lacerated testicle in the Dragons round one loss to North Queensland. 

Frizell remains an outside chance of featuring for St George Illawarra this weekend after he was named 18^th man on Tuesday afternoon.

"Friz is coming along really well, he trained really good last week, he had his first team session today, he's bouncing off walls, he's really happy, he's lifting big weights, which is really good for Tys.

"We'll see how he goes the rest of this week and we'll make a more specific determination on his return to play at the end of the week."

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