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Leeds Rhinos: Time to refocus after our night to remember - McGuire INTERVIEW
WORLD BEATERS: Leeds Rhinos celebrate their World Club Challenge victory over Manly. PIC: Steve Riding
Leeds Rhinos star Danny McGuire provides his view from the pitch.
It is great feeling being on top of the world, but we have got to get our feet back on the ground this week.
We enjoyed the weekend and we celebrated what was a really good performance against Manly in the World Club Challenge.
It’s not often you get an opportunity to play in a massive game like that and call yourselves world champions, so you have to make the most of it, but that was then.
We all came in on Monday and started focusing on the week and the season ahead, beginning with Sunday’s game at Widnes.
Super League’s our bread and butter and we’ve got 25 rounds, plus the Challenge Cup, to come. Our aim is to find some form and play consistently well for the rest of the year. It’s no good being world champions if you play poorly in your own competition.
When we beat Melbourne in 2008 we lost at Castleford in our next game. It is always difficult to back up after such a big effort, but we’ve got a longer week this time with us not playing until Sunday and I think that’ll benefit us.
It will give us a couple of extra days for our bodies to rest up and there’ll be no excuses. We are all focused on Widnes now, which we need to be because they have got some good players.
Judgement
Their 4g pitch has been a big talking point this season, but I will reserve judgement until I’ve played on it.
We have a 3g surface at Kirkstall, which we train on, so it’s nothing new, though we haven’t played a match on one before. The field at Kirkstall has been really good for us and it’s allowed us to get some quality sessions in, despite the bad weather.
There’s been a few injuries at Widnes this year and Richie Mathers’ elbows and knees were in a pretty bad state after Wakefield played there, but every time you play there’s a chance you could get hurt, so it’s not something we are going to worry about.
If you think about it you’ll take your eye off the ball and not do what you need to do, which is go there and play well and get the win. We’ll see how it goes at the weekend and decide what we think about it after that.
Today’s a big day for Jamie Peacock, who’s off to the Palace to visit the Queen. Believe it or not, the boys haven’t been giving him much stick since his MBE was announced, though we’ve come up with a few ideas of what the initials might stand for.
We’re all pleased for him and he really deserves his award. It’ll be a great day for JP and his family and something they’ll remember for the rest of their lives.Congratulations also to my old amateur club, East Leeds, for getting through to the first round of the Challenge Cup. They had a good win at Warrington Wizards last weekend in the preliminary round and good luck to them for the game against Blackbrook on Saturday.
As a Leeds United fan I was pretty pleased to see Neil Warnock unveiled as the new manager. I think he is probably the right man for the job. All his career he has had the knack of getting teams promoted; he did a really good job at Sheffield United and QPR and this is a big opportunity to take one of the biggest clubs in the country back where they belong.
I think he’ll do a good job. They’ve got some decent players there, enough to maybe sneak into the play-offs this year.
Finally, on behalf of all the players at Leeds, I’d like to send sympathies to Ian Millward and his family following the death of his son Robbie last weekend.
Rugby league is a tight-knit game and I think everybody was deeply shocked when they heard the news. I didn’t know Robbie, but he was only 19 and it’s difficult to imagine what his friends and family are going through. I am sure the whole sport will rally round them at this difficult time.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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