Leeds Rhinos: McDermott axe won't distract us insists Hall

Hall was given his Rhinos debut by Tony Smith 11 years ago and also played under Brian McClennan before McDermott was appointed in the autumn of 2010.

Reflecting on the mid-season change of direction, Hall said: “It is a new experience for all of us.

“We just have to get on with it. Nobody knows what to expect because it’s the first time it’s happened during the season so we just have to keep going and see where we go.”

Rhinos’ squad met with chief executive Gary Hetherington and the coaching staff yesterday. They also held a private players’ meeting before their first training session since McDermott’s exit. The backroom staff have remained in place and will share coaching duties this week.

Hall described the mood in the camp as “buoyant” despite this week’s disruption. He said: “We had a chat [yesterday] about how we have to keep going. If you start being negative about things we know how that goes and it’s not very well. We have to be positive about these things.”

The reigning champions are eighth in Betfred Super League and will drop into the bottom-four if Huddersfield Giants beat Hull tonight.

Rhinos’ first game without McDermott is a derby at Castleford Tigers on Sunday and their campaign is getting close to make or break.

“We are running our of games,” Hall conceded. “We haven’t got two points in a long time so it’s vital we start producing some results now.

“It is going to be tough, nothing changes from last week, it is still going to be a tough journey and we as players have got to play well.

“We haven’t beaten Castleford in a league game for a long time. Our form against them hasn’t been the best and they are a good team, but we think we are as well.”

McDermott’s departure came after Leeds were thrashed 46-8 at Wigan Warriors last Thursday, their seventh successive league defeat.

“We were terrible,” Hall said of that performance. “As always, there’s stuff we can learn from that.

“We aren’t doing our job properly if we don’t learn something.”

Rhinos’ initial 19-man squad for Sunday will be named tomorrow. Acting-captain Stevie Ward is set to return after missing three games due to concussion and Anthony Mullally, absent last week because of a similar injury, also trained yesterday.

Brett Delaney (hamstring) could be in contention this weekend and Carl Ablett (calf) is closing in on his return, as is Jamie Jones-Buchanan following knee surgery.

Hall played out of position at centre against Wigan, due to Ash Handley’s hamstring problem and insisted he will do whatever’s required by the team.

“It was a bit more tiring,” he reflected. “There was a bit more work to do defence-wise, especially when we were on the back foot.

“I found it quite different, but I needed to do that role and I’ll do whatever role the coaching staff want me to.”