Huddersfield Giants v Leeds Rhinos - Agar's men in 'great shape' for Super League return

The Betfred Super League clash with Huddersfield Giants, behind closed doors at Emerald Headingley, comes 150 days after Leeds last played, when they crushed Toronto Wolfpack 66-12 on March 5.

That was their fourth successive win, though the result has been deleted after Torontopulled out of the rest of this season.

The two points - and 54 on for and against - Rhinos lost cost them third spot on the table, with Giants leapfrogging them on points difference.

Both teams have had three weeks to train together for tomorrow and Agar admitted: “The break came when we had a fair bit of momentum.”

He said: “Then there was all the uncertainty regarding when we might be back - or if we might be back.

“There’s been a lot to work through in terms of when we’d be able to get the boys back in, what the competition would look like, pay cuts and so on.

“We have put all that behind us now and are very much looking forward to playing.

“The boys have all turned up in great shape, with a great attitude.

“While we may have lost some momentum with the season being interrupted when it was, the players have - for four months - been highly motivated and looking forward to getting back in.

“We left with some good feelings and thoughts about our recent performances and I think that has motivated a lot of our guys during the break.

“There have been times when players have struggled with motivation training on their own, but thankfully we feel most of our squad have come back very fit, certainly aerobically.”

The Leeds boss has been impressed with the skills shown by his players in training, but admitted the “contact side of the game” has been more of a challenge, with the limited preparation time and rules put in place to battle Covid-19.

“It is like the first game of the season,” he added.

“I think there will be a fair bit of unknown in there.”

Huddersfield are officially the home team in a fixture rearranged from February when Storm Ciara made John Smith’s Stadium unsafe.

Leeds will be in away changing rooms, but have had the chance to train twice on the Emerald Headingley pitch.

While Giants are unbeaten on their travels this year, Agar hopes familiar surroundings will help his team - despite new health and safety rules.

“We are trying to make it as normal as we possibly can,” he said.

“We have had the luxury of getting on Headingley [to train] and it’s great we’ve had that sort of opportunity.

“We are trying to make sure it’s business as usual, but we know it will be very different with no crowd there.”

With only 20 rounds in the season, including those already played, teams can’t afford a slow start.

“Every coach wants to get off with a win, but at the same time, in round one there was a lot of hype and anticipation and excitement and we got it handed to us,” Agar recalled of the 30-4 lossa to Hull six months ago.

“We were pretty confident that one result wasn’t going to determine how we were going to go in the season and I think that’ll be the case this weekend.

“Of course we want to get off on the right foot, there’s a lot of positivity from us about being back and trying to reestablish the type of form we had before, but we know we are coming up against a good team and one that started the season really well.”

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Laura Collins