Leeds Rhinos coach talks slow ruck tactics, makes 'deal with it better' call after 6-0 loss v St Helens

Despite an 11-5 penalty count in Rhinos’ favour, referee Jack Smith came under fire from the home fans who accused him of allowing Saints to slow down Leeds in the ruck. They also felt Saints should have had more than one yellow card as they recorded an eighth successive win at AMT Headingley, but Arthur stressed his team let themselves down.

He admitted: “We didn’t deserve to win that game, they outplayed us. You can’t have the amount of opportunities we did and not ice them. It is a good lesson for us and we need to learn from it pretty quickly that everyone needs to play their role, but we need to do it as a team. No one is good enough in this team or in the competition to win it on their own.”

Asked in his post-match press conference about the ruck speed, he insisted: “They’ve done a good job of getting numbers in and slowing it down. We got our fair share of penalties on the back of it, but we have got to learn how to control our emotions and not worry about things that aren’t in our control. We were taking steps backwards to play the ball because they are all in the ruck, but good luck to them - that was obviously their tactic, it frustrated us and it worked. We have got to learn to deal with it better.”

Saints had substitute prop Agnatius Paasi sin-binned in the final quarter following a foul on Rhinos winger Alfie Edgell. Earlier, stand-off Jonny Lomax remained on the field after upending Leeds full-back Lachie Miller and Arthur said: “I think at the start of the year there was lots of sin-bins for not a lot.

“All you want is consistency across the board, that’s all. I don’t want to be frustrated and act on emotion and say things - I need to have a good look before I start making rash statements.”