'Defended particularly well': Leeds Rhinos coach Rohan Smith takes positives from loss at Hull KR

Rhinos trailed 14-0 at half-time and conceded another try just 18 seconds after the break in wet and windy conditions.

Rovers half-back Jordan Abdull targeted Leeds’ debutant full-back Luke Hooley and winger Derrell Olpherts with some testing kicks which led to tries in the opening period.

They replaced Richie Myler (paternity leave) and Nene Macdonald (calf injury) who dropped out on Thursday and Smith said: “It’s probably where you don’t want to be playing, with the rain coming in sideways against probably the premier kicker in the competition.

“The best way to learn is through experience, it’s not what happens to you, it’s what you do about it.

“Some of the greatest players in the world have had bad nights. It’s a team event, dealing with kicks - those guys will put the work in and they will bounce back.”

Assessing the overall performance, Smith said: “I thought we defended our tryline particularly well.

“Overall, our tackling was good. We had a tough few moments in the first-half defusing kicks.

“The way the second-half started was particularly disappointing, but aside from that I thought there was a lot of effort; we defended well, they had 100 and something plays to our 50-odd in the first-half and we didn’t look fatigued.

“We were right in it and were coming home reasonably well, so we showed that condition.”

Smith added: “Our retention with the ball was okay, mostly.There was a lot of resilience, at 18-0 we put our head down and played together.

“It’s one of those where a few moments of kick defence hurt us, but overall I don’t think there was much between the teams.”

Rhinos lost winger David Fusitu’a to an ankle injury early in the game. Smith said: “When someone like Fus comes off, limping like that, it’s going to be a mid-term injury at least. That’s not good, but we’ll get him sorted and get him back.”