Leeds Rhinos hails 'fight' in crucial win, salutes beaten Wakefield Trinity, is 'happy' for Jack Sinfield

Last night’s (Friday) 24-22 comeback win at Wakefield Trinity took Leeds to 36 points and confirmed their place in the play-offs with five rounds remaining. They did it the hard way, not going ahead until the 77th minute, having trailed 16-0 with half an hour played and 22-6 early in the second half.

Arthur reflected “Wakefield are a good side and they did a really good job - they came after us and threw everything at us. I am proud of the boys and it is nice we can come out on the other side of it.

“We’ve still got a fair bit of work to do, but when you’ve got that sort of fight and want and will, it gives you a good starting point. We haven’t had to play a game like that, of that intensity for a while; we’ve had things our own way for a while so that will really do us good.”

The coach added: “I thought our young blokes stood up too, under some pressure situations. Pres [Presley Cassell] did a good job, Alfie [Edgell] did a good job. Unfortunately I couldn’t get Zak Lloyd out there, I didn’t think it would have been great for him in that sort of pressure.”

After a solid start, Rhinos conceded three tries in eight minutes at the start of the second quarter. Arthur reflected: “It is hard once a team gets momentum. They got a sniff and we were on the back foot and got a couple of things wrong.

“There might have been a tough penalty against us on tackle four which gave them possession, they brought those two interchanges [Caius Faatili and Caleb Hamlin-Uele] and they did a really good job.

“We might have gifted them the ball and field position and we paid the price for it. We will learn plenty of lessons out of that. I didn’t like the way it was going, but now - on reflection - we can take plenty out of it.”

Asked if he felt his side could still win after Trinity scored their fourth try, Arthur stated: “I was interested to see what our reaction was going to be. How tough and how much character we had and did we want to keep going after it?

“In the past I reckon in those sorts of situations, especially last year and maybe at the start of this year, we would have self-imploded and been our own worst enemy, but we just got back on track, kept our composure, chased the last tackle, scrambled hard and got ourselves back into it.”

Of sealing a top-six place, the coach stressed: “That’s great, but we’ve got plenty to learn from that game. Our footy wasn’t where it needed to be, but in the context of the game we were tough, physical, we had to show plenty of character and we’ll learn plenty from it. That’s exactly the contest we needed.”

Arthur used only three of his four substitutes, but Cameron Smith, Presley Cassell and Tom Holroyd all helped turn the game Leeds’ way after Trinity seemed to be in control. Arthur said: “Our starting middles were really good early, then got a bit tired.

“We got run off our feet a bit, but they haven’t had that intensity in a game for a long time. It has done us more favours than anything and we managed to get the two points, which is even better.”

Former Leeds scrum-half Jack Sinfield scored a try and three goals for Wakefield. “He was good,” Arthur agreed. “We are happy for him. We would have loved him to stay at our club, but we didn’t have that pathway when we’ve got Brodie Croft and Jake Connor there. He had a pathway here [at Wakefield], he’s going well and we are really happy for him. He has done a great job.”