Ian Watson’s thoughts on Morgan Smithies head high tackle, Chris Hill injury update and missed conversion attempts

For the third time in his career, Ian Watson has had to deal with the heartache of a final loss.

But this one could have hurt even more given how dominant Huddersfield were for large parts of the game only for a brilliant Liam Marshall try to deny them at the death.

After the game, Watson summed up his emotions: “Massively tough. The boys put in massive shift and I thought they were outstanding and the best team for large parts of the game.

“We just not got what we deserved today probably. It’s worse than the other times because we deserved it today.”

When the Giants were totally on top, key forward Chris Hill limped off the field taking with him most of the Giants’ final experience especially with Theo Fages absent.

Watson explained how this loss impacted his team and gave an update on the prop: “It’s huge, especially on the back of not having Theo Fages. Those kind of players are massive in these kind of games. Chris Hill I thought was outstanding and killing it to be fair so to lose him was a big big blow.

“Having him come on for a second spell might have just given us that little bit more composure to be able to dominate the field position again.

“We think it’s his calf we’ll have to send him for a scan. We don’t know how long it will be.”

The Giants lost by just two points today a cruel margin made worse by the fact Tui Lolohea missed four shots at goal which could have seen the Giants win had only two of them sailed between the sticks.

Watson however stated that they won’t dwell on these misses and that there were bigger reasons for their defeat: “It is what it is. Goal kickers are labelled but we could have still won the game without that before and I’ve had a good conversation with Tui.

“There’s other situations where we’ve lost this game.”

Lastly, he had his say on Morgan Smithies two high tackles one of which would likely have yielded a yellow card at the start of the season during the crack down on contact with the head.

Watson was surprised no card was shown: “I was expecting more if I’m honest but he didn’t give it. We’ll have to see what the match review panel say, I thought it was a deciding moment to be fair.”