It is widely accepted in any sport that nothing is won or lost in the first three weeks of the season but with the reintroduction of promotion and relegation in Super League this year, there are some teams who will be happier than others after three games.
Although Leeds Rhinos will be delighted with three straight wins, even without hitting their very best form, the story for their West Yorkshire neighbours Huddersfield is very different.
A third straight loss – their worst start to a season since 2007 – provides worry in terms of the early league table, but their performance on the field offers plenty of hope for the future. After staring down the barrel at 18-0 early on in this game, the Giants rallied to lead 24-22 with less than 10 minutes remaining before surrendering to a late Paul Aiton try that sealed victory for the Rhinos.
This was a marked improvement for the Giants, who will head into next weekend’s clash against Widnes with genuine belief that they are close to a first win of Super League XX. Their character and endeavour could not be questioned and, although spirit only gets you so far, the Giants showed enough to suggest that they will be looking up this year, as opposed to nervously over their shoulder.
“I thought our effort and resilience was very good,” their coach, Paul Anderson, said. “From the hole we put ourselves in at 18-0 down, there was a decision to be made. Thankfully we made a decision to dig in and show character.”
The Rhinos were in complete control and 18 points up in the first half-hour but somehow transpired to let their opponents back into the game with numerous errors. They managed to hold on to their unbeaten record this year with that late score, but only just.
“I didn’t think it was a great performance,” said the Leeds coach, Brian McDermott. “I’m happy we’ve won because that’s what we wanted to do, but there’s not much from that game I want to take over the next week. There are quite a lot of things that I want us to be better at.”
It looked anything like being a tight finish 30 minutes into the game, after tries from Carl Ablett, Adam Cuthbertson and Ryan Hall eased the home side into a comfortable 18-0 lead. From then on, the Giants began to rally.
Two tries in the 10 minutes before the break gave Huddersfield hope though. First, Jamie Ellis scored a solo try, then the centre Joe Wardle barged his way over to reduce the gap to just six points at half-time.
A sloppy start cost Huddersfield points seconds after the restart, as Leeds extended their lead through their prolific winger Tom Briscoe, who kept up his record of scoring in every Super League game so far this year.
Given how they had not scored a point after the break in both of their opening two Super League games, things were looking bleak for the Giants. However, they dug deep, and scores from Kyle Wood and Brett Ferres saw them surge into an unlikely lead with just 10 minutes left.
That lead lasted just three minutes. Aiton, who had been in the thick of the action all night for Leeds, barged over from dummy-half to restore Leeds’ lead and ultimately sealed the win.
Leeds Hardaker; Briscoe, Watkins, Moon, Hall; Sinfield, McGuire; Cuthbertson, Aiton, Peacock, Ablett, Ward, Jones-Buchanan
Interchange Achurch, Leuluai, Sutcliffe, Singleton
Huddersfield Connor; McGillvary, Cudjoe, Wardle, Murphy; Brough, Ellis; Huby, Lunt, Mullally, Ferres, Hughes, Ta’ai
Interchange Wood, Kopczak, Lawrence, Crabtree
Referee P Bentham (Warrington)
