Leeds Rhinos suffer 'significant' injuries in shattering golden-point loss to St Helens

Rhinos lost Aidan Sezer (groin), Harry Newman (hamstring) and Morgan Gannon (ankle) in the first 32 minutes and had James McDonnell sent off in the closing stages.

Even so, they led 12-4 at half-time, Saints didn’t level until the 69th minute and both sides missed chances to win it before Lewis Dodd snatched a 13-12 victory for the visitors with a drop goal 32 seconds before the end of golden-point extra-time.

Smith was unaware of the extent of the injuries straight after the game, but said: “It’s clearly not good news.

“They will all be significant injuries. When players get replaced in the manner they did, you know they’re not returning for the game.

“They will get reviewed and scanned and whatnot over the weekend and we’ll find the outcomes of those, but let’s not take away from the blokes who were out there and did what they did, on both teams.

“St Helens are an unbelievable team, experience - they know how to win the big games, but they had to earn every bit they got.”

From this season, teams have been permitted to name an 18th man on the bench, but he can only be used following three failed head injury assessments.

Smith doesn’t believe that should be expanded to include the sort of injuries Leeds suffered on Friday.

“Those injuries were attrition-based,” he said. “If it’s foul play and somebody gets injured you should be able to use the 18th man.

“But for injuries, that’s just the attrition of the game; sometimes it goes your way and sometimes it doesn’t.

“We want attrition in our game, that’s why we want the game to be sped up a bit. We don’t want stoppages and if people get injured and that makes it harder for a team [that’s okay] as long as it’s not foul play.I would encourage the use of the 18th man to be brought in on foul play.”

Smith said stand-off Blake Austin, who has missed two games with a calf muscle injury, will not be fit for next Saturday’s Magic Weekend derby against Castleford Tigers.