Tonight was a damaging night for Tony Smith and his Hull KR side.
Not only did their run of good form come to a surprise end at the hands of an injury hit Leeds side in a 12-0 defeat, but the Robins now have a number of injury concerns going into next weekend’s Challenge Cup semi-final against Huddersfield.
Nonetheless, first and foremost, Tony Smith’s focus was on the performance and he felt like on another day it might have been a different story: “On another day maybe we would have gotten on top of them but well done to Leeds, I’m not making any excuses about the performance at all.”
It might have been a different result had Lachlan Coote stayed on the field but a head collision with Leeds skipper Kruise Leeming saw him leave the field due to a HIA.
Smith was unsure of his condition after the game: “Not sure. He is a concern in terms of the fact he got sparked out. He’s fine now, he’s just spoken to the team now. What would be a concern how he is for next week.
“I can’t tell you [if he passed his HIA] but we certainly weren’t going to put him back out there on the park.”
There was also an injury for Sam Wood which Smith provided an update on: “Knee, it’s a concern. He doesn’t think it’s his acl, he thinks it’s in another part of his knee but I’d be surprised if he’s available next week.”
One player who picked up an injury but should be okay for the semi-final was Matt Parcell. Of him, Smith said: “He’s okay. It was his neck, it wasn’t a head injury situation”
Completing the four new injury concerns was Matty Storton who came off due to a shoulder problem: “He’s done his AC in his shoulder. Some people are able to play with ACs but some can’t and that’s not down to one’s toughness that’s down to how severe it is.”
However, there is a surprise boost for the Robins with Kane Linnett having a chance of playing next week. Originally it was believed we wouldn’t see him for eight weeks after he tore his bicep but that may no longer be the case: “Kane will be able to play on, he is at risk.
“The surgeon has told him he can’t operate on him for a couple of weeks, so should he play and it tears entirely he’s in no worse position because he’s going to repair it anyway. He can carry on so I think Kane will probably carry on and see what happens. So, he either plays on with it and it doesn’t go [tear fully] or gets it operated on if it does. We’ve a chance of having him.”
There were two notable absentees for Hull KR tonight. Shaun Kenny-Dowall was rested whilst Jez Litten was not risked after a knee injury last week. On Litten, Smith said: “I think [he will be available next week]. He had a scan on his knee last week. They found nothing bad, it was sore. I probably could’ve risked him but he could have been further injured so we didn’t take that gamble so we can have an extra fresh body next week.”
