Winger Ilies Macani scored nine tries in 29 Super League appearances during two spells with London Broncos, including last season when he touched down five times in 14 games.
Macani, who has also featured for London Skolars, Bradford Bulls and Sheffield Eagles, was a try scorer at Headingley last June, when Broncos took Leeds to golden-point extra-time before losing to a Brodie Croft drop goal.
Warriors coach Kimbo Parkinson revealed Macani responded to an SOS in the week before Saturday’s tie. He said: “Our centre had a knee injury which ruled him out and we were a bit light on backs.
“Ilies answered a call from us. He’s not playing for a league club at the moment, he is playing rugby union.
“Hopefully this gets him wanting to play rugby league again, whether that be for us or he signs a contract somewhere. It would be good to see him out there playing rugby league.”
Parkinson felt his players left Headingley with heads held high, despite their heavy defeat.
Leeds Rhinos praised for classy touch after Challenge Cup win
The spirit of @TheChallengeCup as the @wests_warriors boys come into the Rhinos changing room to enjoy a drink together after the game pic.twitter.com/LB1TSptMzX
— Leeds Rhinos (@leedsrhinos) February 8, 2025
The two teams posed for a joint picture after the game and Rhinos coach Brad Arthur went into Warriors’ changing room to thank them for playing in the right spirit.
“He didn’t have to do that,” Parkinson said. “That’s the sign of a great coach, it made our players respect him even more.
“It was a big deal and we’ll take away this whole experience – from the bus ride up to the bus ride home, we’re going to soak it all up and enjoy it.”
The prospect of an amateur team facing a near full-strength Super League side raised fears for the safety of the Warriors players, but Parkinson insisted his team loved every minute. “After the Army game in the last round we sat down as a group and talked about it,” he said.
“There were injury concerns from people outside the club, but our players were happy to come up here and play.
“It didn’t worry them at all that they were playing against a professional outfit. It didn’t concern us; we were realistic about the match, we weren’t going to win the game, but we wanted to do our club proud and London rugby league proud and I think we did.
“Perhaps we might have been a bit taken aback by the occasion, in the first five-10 minutes, but we went into the sheds at half-time and reassessed everything and the players were keen to get back out there.
“For us, the scoreline doesn’t reflect the game in terms of what we are going to take from it. There’s a lot of things we can improve and work on, but it’s going to put us in good stead for the season because we aren’t going to come up against a Leeds Rhinos in the Southern Conference.”
