Leeds Rhinos news: pre-season games in doubt after Challenge Cup revamp

Rhinos have games arranged for Boxing Day, at home to Wakefield Trinity and Sunday, January 26, when Wigan Warriors are the visitors for Ash Handley’s testimonial, but annual clashes with Hunslet and Bradford Bulls could be scrapped.

Other than in the Covid-hit pre-season of 2021, Rhinos have visited Hunslet every year since 2004. They have also played Bradford Bulls in each of the past four pre-seasons, with the fixture alternating between AMT Headingley and Odsal, where it was staged in 2024.

The clubs are in discussions about those fixtures taking place again next year, but the revised Challenge Cup schedule has made finding dates difficult. Hunslet and Bulls, along with the other UK-based Betfred Championship and League One clubs, enter the Cup on the weekend of January 25/26. Top-flight sides begin a fortnight later, just a week before Super League kicks off, when all 12 will visit lower league opposition.

Dates for the first round of the Championship have yet to be confirmed. The competition was due to start on the opening weekend of February, but that could be pushed back two weeks after plans for a mid-season representative break were rejected by Super League clubs.

Leeds are reluctant to play the week before their first competitive match and the home clash with Wigan is earmarked as their full-scale rehearsal for the new campaign. In addition, Rhinos - who haven’t beaten Hunslet since 2017 - would have to rethink their policy of fielding a mainly academy/reserves side following the south Leeds club’s promotion to the Championship.

The pre-season meeting was known as the Lazenby Cup until 2017, when it was renamed the Harry Jepson OBE Memorial Trophy. Jepson was a former Hunslet stalwart and Rugby Football League director who later became president of the Leeds club. If the fixture is abandoned, the Harry Jepson Trophy name could be transferred to another competition, with one option being the annual youth games between teams from north and south Leeds.

Rhinos usually put out a mixture of first team and lower grade players against Bradford when the Keith Howard Foundation Trophy is up for grabs.