Kruise Leeming column: Leeds Rhinos star reveals injury latest, issues Wakefield Trinity derby warning

I had a few anxious moments when it happened, but thankfully the injury I got last week doesn’t seem to be anything long term.

The physios had a look at it on Monday and they were happy with where it was at, so there could be a chance of me playing this week.

I need to see how it settles and how the swelling goes down. It all depends on that, but it’s better than we first thought and there’s no lasting damage, so that’s positive news.

It is the same place on the same foot I hurt last year and that was a worry. I think my body was scared of it - because it has happened before - and it shut down when I got the bang. The muscles around it shut down and it was killing me, I actually thought it had gone, but it is good I have healed pretty quickly.

Getting the win took some of the pain off. I was in the changing room at the time, watching the game on a laptop, but - because the signal under the stand was so bad - it kept buffering and I didn’t know if Blake Austin had hit the drop goal or not.

It was very good news when I heard we had won; it was brilliant for us as a team and exactly what we needed. I said in last week’s column we needed a morale-booster and we got that.

Hopefully, winning away to St Helens will give our season a kick start and we can get some momentum now, but we’ve got a tough game on Friday against Wakefield.

They’ve lost their first three matches, but will be looking to do to us what we did to Saints. We don’t want to be the ones on the end of a shock this week.

There have been some unexpected results already, including Leigh getting their first win of the season away to Hull KR, who had beaten Wigan in round one.

I think that’s great for the sport, because you never want a team running away with a competition or one to be tailed off at the bottom of the table.

I think at the moment fans are turning up to games not knowing who’s going to win and that’s how it should be. It makes for exciting rugby, which is what fans and players want.

A lot of sides look strong this year. Saints are still the team to beat, but Catalans have had three good wins, I feel like Warrington will be up there this year and Hull KR look like a good team. That’s just mentioning four, but a couple of those struggled at times last year and it seems they have turned things around, which is credit to them.

When everyone’s putting their best foot forward it obviously raises the level of the competition and then you get the one-point wins and dramatic finishes, which are what spectators want to see. Endings like ours last week put the sport in a good light and that’s only a positive for us as players.

There’s no fixtures you look at and think ‘we can play poorly and win this’ and that means you have to be on your game every week.

That’s definitely our focus this week. We know how good a team Wakefield can be, we have had some really close, tight games against them while I’ve been at the club and when they get on a roll, they are as dangerous an attacking team as any in the competition.

It would be so unsatisfying for us to win at Saints and then lose at home to Wakefield, so we will be preparing as well as we can and definitely won’t be taking them lightly because of the results they have suffered.

One win can get your season on track and Wakey will be out to do that this week. We know we have to be on the ball or we’ll get an ugly surprise.

Speaking of surprises, I didn’t expect to see the news of Lee Radford leaving Castleford this week, just three weeks into the season.

I am good mates with Alex Mellor who I played with at Huddersfield and Leeds before he went to Cas last year. I was at his house on Monday and he was saying how much of a shock that was. It is never nice to see someone lose their job, whether it’s at your club or anywhere else and I feel for him. I hope he bounces back and wish him all the best in whatever he does next.