YEP Jury: Leeds Rhinos must learn lessons after stuttering start to the season

ANDREW SUTCLIFFE

The game against Wakefield was disappointing after the improvements made in recent weeks.

Looking back, we were soundly beaten by a team who exploited a weakness down our right side defence. I felt it was more poor individuals than a collective bad team performance. The times we actually had the ball on attack in their half we caused problems and exposed their poor defending on the edges.

After last week’s complaints about the standard of refereeing I feel the Wakefield game highlighted this. The nine-eight count looks even, until you realise the last six of ours came in the last 20 minutes or so when the game was lost. I get puzzled by decisions throughout games that are not consistent. It’s not an excuse in the slightest because refs don’t miss tackles and Leeds need to learn to keep their mouths shut.

So on to Hull and a team who always get up for the visit of Leeds. From a team that couldn’t buy a win recently they’re now on a two-game winning run so another tough game awaits.

THOMAS LAWRENCE

After the promising performance at St Helens it felt like Leeds had taken a few leaps forward in terms of progressing into this 2019 Super League season – but Friday’s disappointing performance at home to Wakefield certainly feels like a few steps back again.

It just seems like lessons aren’t being learned – particularly defensive ones.

For the second successive week, Leeds have conceded easy four-pointers that have been defended very softly, and in all honesty not very difficult for the opposition to score. This needs fixing very quickly if Leeds are going to be a competing force again – defence was the bedrock of all our success in the so called ‘Golden Era’.

It’s now getting difficult every week to just keep saying ‘learn from it and move on’ – but something needs to give for Leeds.

Another tough away game at Hull FC on Friday, who after back-to-back wins will certainly feel more confident than Leeds.

The tough tasks will be to minimise the risk of Marc Sneyd’s kicking game and fix up this broken defence.

Off the back of this, Leeds need to find that clinical attack from the first half at St Helens and maybe the points will come home.

OLIVER HAWKHEAD

I think it is clear that Friday night’s game wasn’t the homecoming that we all wanted.

Dave Furner’s comments about our goal line defence and lack of discipline were spot on. We were our own worst enemy for most of the game and we often looked fragile against a Wakefield Trinity side that didn’t play to their full potential.

Wakey’s tries were relatively simple (bar a superb Tom Johnstone effort) and pretty much all down the same side. I will never use this space to talk about the referee.

My view is that he will only penalise if players give him a reason to do so.

I always like to read the comments on Leeds Rhinos’ Facebook page after a game to see what other fans’ views on the game were.

Konrad Hurrell passion deservedly earned him a lot of plaudits, however I found it hard to understand why some fans still haven’t warmed to Tui Lolohea. He assisted all four tries and created countless other opportunities that we weren’t good enough to take. He was by far our best player on the night.

LUKE CROSSFIELD

I am hoping that last Friday’s performance is going to be just a blip. I don’t think many teams will come to Headingley and play like Wakefield did this season.

We badly need a leader in the pack and someone who is not going to back down from the challenge.

Our discipline is very disappointing and well done to the referee for sending Trent Merrin to the sin-bin, we can’t have that from our senior players.

It’s been a fantastic start from the under-19s team and the two signings from Widnes Vikings will bolster their chances of success.

From the England Academy Test matches against the Aussies Sam Walters looks a fantastic prospect. Plus a mention for the women’s team for their comprehensive win against York last Sunday.

Another journey on the M62 on Friday night to Hull who have started to win a couple of games on the back of the return of Gareth Ellis.

A big improvement is needed for us to get a much-needed two points.

KATIE BURROWS

It’s difficult to talk about the positives from Friday’s game, there weren’t many! Our attack was promising in parts, but, as is often the case with us, the final play was usually not quite there.

It was a disappointing evening at the revamped Headingley, and even more disappointing that we put in such a lacklustre performance, especially given how much we have improved since round one.

We failed to close Tom Johnstone down early doors, which proved to be problematic – the defence on that right side is very worrying.

Full credit to Wakefield, they played well, but we were dreadful.

Looking ahead to Hull FC, it’s clear we need to go back to basics by working on our defence and discipline again (how many times have we heard that?).

It will be a tough ask, as Hull have had a couple of wins recently, but it really depends which Leeds side turns up; if we play like we did at Saints in the first half then we will be a match for any team, if we play like we did last week we could be heading for another heavy defeat.

TIM NUTTALL

Friday was meant to be the big homecoming for the Rhinos; the first home game of the season in front of the revamped Headingley. Unfortunately, Wakefield came to spoil the party and seemingly the Rhinos forgot to turn up at all.

There had been promise of better things after last Friday’s excellent performance at St Helens, however, the standards that were set, even in defeat, were not maintained.

Of a particular concern is how Wakefield seemed to attack our right edge with ease, we seemed unable to come up with the answers to thwart the constant threat of Bill Tupou and Tom Johnstone and, as ever when Danny Brough plays against us, he had a really good game.

The one thing that looks, on paper, an easy fix-up is our lack of discipline, which kept inviting Wakefield into promising positions.

We simply have to become harder to score against, both in terms of giving up cheap metres and cheap tries.

We travel to Hull FC on Friday, who will be on a high after two wins from two. Here’s hoping for significant improvement and consistency.