Leeds Rhinos: Top four place is at risk admits worried boss Mac

Rhinos are on a three-game losing run and have won just two of 10 competitive games this year.

“I’m confident we’ll get some momentum and string some games together,” McDermott said.

“That will coincide with a couple of things that will happen off-field for us as well.

“There’s certain things happening off the field. As coach of this team I’d be foolish to wave those off and say they’re not affecting us.

“I’m confident when certain things off the field happen for us we’ll get it back. But there comes a point in the season when making the top-four is probably mathematically going to be out of our hands.

“That’s a reality, nobody knows that more than we do. I don’t think it’s out of our grasp yet, but that’s the situation we are in.”

McDermott said the “off-field” issues are injuries and the loss of Rhinos’ Kirkstall training base, which was badly damaged in the Boxing Day flood.

“We haven’t had any consistency to how we train in the last three weeks,” McDermott said.

“Then the injuries we’ve had when we have had field sessions, I have never known it ever – as a player or coach – where players can’t train, physically can’t train through the week.

“We’ve a fair few players who just rock up and play on game day because that’s all they can do. And some of them should not be playing.”