Leeds Rhinos boss hails professional Challenge Cup effort, praises amateurs, provides update on injury scare

Rhinos’ Betfred Super League campaign begins at home to Wakefield Trinity next Saturday, seven days on from their 92-0 romp in the Challenge Cup third round. Wakefield were also in the points today, beating League One Goole Vikings 82-0 and Arthur is looking forward to what he reckons will be a tough opening test. “Can’t wait,” he insisted. “All the hard work starts now.”

Arthur included 15 of his top-20 players in the matchday squad against Warriors, from the Southern Conference and felt his men did a professional job. He also praised the amateurs and the way they approached the game.

“We wanted to focus on our discipline,” he said. “There were a couple of things we wanted to be good at, we didn’t want the game to get loose and we needed to respect ourselves, the competition and those guys [Wests] with a high completion rate. I thought our completions was really good.

“In those sorts of games you get a tendency to want to play a little bit different. We still gave a couple of penalties away which we can avoid, but overall we are happy we’ve got through that game now and we want to make sure we thank the opposition.

“They played the game in good spirits and me and Bleasey [sporting director Ian Blease] went to thank them. They got a good experience out of it and hopefully it helps grow their club.”

Of Warriors, he added: “They had a crack, big Sambo [Sam Lisone] was running hard off the kick-offs and they got their bodies in front, they played for the full 80 minutes and they should be proud of themselves. They kept turning up, they were physical and they put their bodies on the line. They are not a professional outfit and that’s the difference, but we’re grateful they played the game in the right spirit. They came with the right intentions.”

Rhinos lost Jack Sinfield to a foot injury in the second half, but he was walking without crutches after the match and Arthur said: “I think he’s okay. I think it is a bruise, it has just blown up from a bit of contact. The physio’s pretty confident he’s all right.”

Sinfield, who started out of position at hooker before shifting to his regular role in the halves, scored a couple of tries and set up another. “He was nice and physical,” Arthur said. “He has got stronger in pre-season, so he’s looking good. He gives us some options.”

Arthur revealed not immediately bringing on a replacement following Sinfield’s injury was a pre-planned tactic. He said: “I left us with 12 men for eight minutes or so, just to see how we go.

“We’ve been practicing a bit of that. We told the coach from the other team we’d do it at some stage. It was no disrespect to them, but we’ve been doing a bit of work in case we get put in that situation this year, so it was a good opportunity to do it.”