Leeds Rhinos talking points: Things are looking up but coach Rohan Smith won't get carried away

Rhinos’ 40-4 win at Warrington Wolves was their highest score since a 46-10 success away to Leigh last August and set them up nicely for Friday’s visit to fourth-placed Huddersfield Giants.

Here are five talking points.

1: Where next? Rohan Smith clearly isn’t a coach who wears his heart on his sleeve. Asked where Rhinos go from here following the big win at Warrington, his answer was “Huddersfield, on Friday”. There doesn’t seem to be much danger of Smith letting a couple of wins go to his head, or the players’, but the improvement from earlier in the year - begun on Jamie Jones-Buchanan’s watch - is clear to see. Four wins from their last five matches and just two tries conceded in the past two hints at what this team has always had the talent to do.

2: Perspective. That said, four of Rhinos’ five victories so far have been against teams alongside them in the bottom half of the table. The next two matches, at Huddersfield and table-topping St Helens, will be much tougher and a better gauge of where Rhinos are right now.

3: Kruise control. Rhinos’ captain has done a solid job whenever asked to fill in at scrum-half, but Leeds are a much better team with Kruise Leeming at number nine. He controlled the ruck against Warrington and that laid the platform for victory. At 26, Leeming can still improve and could develop into one of the most influential players in Super League over the next few years.

4: Handy Ash. Winger Ash Handley - who is Super League’s top metre-maker so far this season - deserved his two tries at Warrington and clearly enjoyed the long-range interception late on. Rightly so. He has earned moments like that having been consistently good all year, even when the team was in a hole.

5: In the pink. Rhinos have scored more than 30 points only twice this season, both when they were in their pink away kit. Maybe they should wear it more often.