Two Leeds Rhinos players are facing medical checks ahead of Sunday’s derby at Castleford Tigers.

Rhinos, who have remained healthy for most of the season, went into last Saturday’s win at Catalans Dragons without winger Ryan Hall and prop Keenan Palasia and picked up three knocks during the game, including the loss of front-rower Cooper Jenkins in the first half. He suffered blurred vision, but did not need a head injury assessment.

The Australian forward was examined by a specialist in France on Sunday and cleared to fly home. The specialist was happy there was no serious damage and Rhinos’ medical team will assess him later in the week.

The other starting prop, Mikolaj Oledzki, didn’t return to the field after his initial spell and scrum-half Jake Connor was replaced in the closing minutes, but both are expected to be available for the trip to OneBore Stadium. “Mikolaj was a bit of a stinger,” coach Brad Arthur said. “He could have gone back on, but we didn’t need to put him back out there.”

Leeds Rhinos props Mikolaj Oledzki, left and Cooper Jenkins - both seen after the recent Magic Weekend win against Bradford Bulls, both failed to finish last Saturday's game at Catalans Dragons. Picture by Callum Pilkington/SWpix.com.

placeholder image — Leeds Rhinos props Mikolaj Oledzki, left and Cooper Jenkins - both seen after the recent Magic Weekend win against Bradford Bulls, both failed to finish last Saturday's game at Catalans Dragons. Picture by Callum Pilkington/SWpix.com.

Connor has taken a knock in the final stages of Leeds’ past three games, but Arthur was unconcerned after the latest incident. He said: “His neck got crunched up and a stringer in that shoulder, but he was fine.”

Hall is recovering from a foot injury sustained in the Magic Weekend victory against Bradford Bulls earlier this month. The timeframe of his layoff is not known.

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Palasia missed the game in Perpignan with a similar issue and is due to undergo a scan early this week. He took part in Rhinos’ final training session before they flew to France, but staff decided not to risk him on the hard ground at Stade Gilbert Brutus.

A foot injury kept Keenan Palasia out of Leeds Rhinos' win against Catalans Dragons in Perpignan. Picture by Allan McKenzie/SWpix.com.

The cross-Channel victory was Rhinos’ seventh in succession, four of them away from AMT Headingley. Leeds lost four of their opening eight games on the road this season and Arthur stressed: “We’ve been building with our away performances. We made a change four or five weeks ago to our mentality and our prep and the boys have bought in.”

With a four-point advantage at the top of the table after 18 of the 27 rounds, Rhinos are closing in on their first league leaders’ shield since 2015, but Arthur is taking nothing for granted. “There’s still a long way to go, nine games to get through,” he warned.

“We have got a real mentality at the moment of a week-to-week grind and making sure we continue to be a team that’s reliable with how they turn up. You might not always be your best performance-wise, but in terms of our team identity we want to make sure we are reliable and they can look around the room and know they’ve got that trust, that their mate’s going to be there and they can depend on them.”

Tigers, who are third from bottom in the table, also have fresh injury concerns. Star centre Krystian Mapapalangi missed last Saturday’s narrow defeat at Leigh Leopards after being hurt in the warm-up. Forward Jordan Lane limped off in the second half with a hip flexor problem. Like Leeds, Tigers avoided any charges from this week’s match review panel.