Leeds Rhinos boss Brad Arthur has reflected on tonight’s 20-16 defeat to Leigh Leopards, whilst also providing an injury update.
The Rhinos’ unbeaten home record came to a crashing halt, as the Leopards produced arguably one of the upsets of the season.
The returning Ryan Hall crossed just two minutes into the game thanks to an audacious Jake Connor pass.
That off-the-cuff play would be the theme of Leeds’ night, with far too many outside-the-box plays and not enough structure in attack being their downfall.
“Credit to Leigh,” Arthur said to the press when asked for his overall thoughts. “They scrambled really well, and they were pretty brave.
“I felt like we dominated most of the game, most of the stats. The biggest stat we didn’t dominate was the scoreboard.
“I thought our effort were really good. We tried really hard. We were nice and physical, plenty of want and desire. We just got a bit of detail wrong around some big moments.
Asked if the side were disjoined in the second half, which looked to be the case given their lack of attacking execution, he replied: “Yeah, at times attacking the try line we probably looked to go a bit lateral, and the space was probably right in front of us.
“We got put under a bit of pressure, they scrambled hard and kepy turning up. We’ll get plenty of learning out of that.
“…I just felt like everyone was trying really hard, and we just didn’t quite get some of the execution right or come up with the right choice of pass at the right time.
“I don’t know what our completions were, but I reckon they would have been pretty high. We dominated the field position. We threw plenty at them, probably a bit too much.”
Leeds Rhinos boss provides injury update
James McDonnell was a notable omission for Leeds this evening, with the back rower missing only his second game of the year.
Arthur revealed that he suffered a “small strain” in his pec in the final tackle of the win over Wakefield.
“He’s looking at a couple of weeks,” he explained. “The likelihood of him returning is probably the Hull game at the end [of the season].”
Jack Bird failed a HIA in the game, which forced a reshuffle in the backline. On his condition, Arthur said: “It’s just a HIA.”
There were concerns that it could be something more, with the Australian copping a nasty blow after clashing heads with David Armstrong, but barring the usual 11-day stand-down, meaning he will miss next week’s trip to York, he will be ready for the following week’s trip to St Helens.
In terms of McDonnell’s replacement, Zak Lloyd did a stellar job coming off the bench, whilst in Bird’s absence Arthur noted exciting prospect Oscar Brown as a potential replacement, after he returned to action in the reserves this week.
