Dennis betts is a class bloke. just watched his post match interview. what every coach should be like.

Very poor for 65mins lots of effort but very poor execution and sloppy play, then sublime for last 15.
Cuthbertson looks the business, and great spell from Achurch. Briscoe awesome. World class try.

We weren't very poor for 65 mins. The first 65 mins were the reason we could be sublime in the last 15 mins.

There was some sloppy play in the first 15 mins but after Widnes' try we totally closed them out of the game with some good metres, excellent kick & chase followed up by excellent defence to pin Widnes in their own 30m. The attack wasn't quite firing to start with, we were struggling to create a gap, but those gaps were then created and exposed later on after we'd worn them down.

Far too many unforced errors and we got dragged into a very slow grind for an hour.
Then once we opened up and got decent quick ball wide we opened them up at will Cuthbertson deservedly named M.O.M at the ground but Briscoe ran him very close.
Yates got the last 10 minutes and didn't look out of place but imo should have been used sooner Achurch had a real positive impact when he got on as well.
Mags was the better of the 2 H/B's imo and until the last 15 minutes Sinfield killed moves too often either choosing to go himself when we had options out wide or passing too slow giving their defence too much time to close us down.
Defensively we were in full control (their try aside) and i thought Ward's work rate out wide was very good.
Overall a convincing win in the end once we started taking the right options and upped the pace but plenty of improvement needed going forward.

My general thoughts on the march. We seemed to look average in attack for 45 minutes in attack and poor near their try line.
But the last 15 minutes we looked like we could score from our own half. Widnes players did look tired to be fair.
Cuthbertson to me was the stand out player. Also thought a lot of players did a decent job.
It still annoys me that McDermott spells certain players for 10 minutes.
How on todays game can you judge Yates whether he deserves to be dropped or keep his place?
Anyway happy with a win against a team that are normally pretty solid and have beaten most of the other team at least once in the last two years.

Truly a game of two halves.
Both sides were poor for the first 40 minutes.
They had no pressure apart from following a penalty for obstruction on halfway. They then scored via Manufokoa (sp?) rumbling over from 5 metres that could have been prevented had we been able to get a third man into the tackle.
That was the only time I recall they got anywhere near to our line whereas we must have lost the ball half a dozen times within their 20.
That pattern continued for the first 20 minutes or so in the second half. They struggled to get out of their half, we got close a number of times but found ways to drop the ball.
Then it all clicked & we ran away with it.
I personally would have made Briscoe MoM but Cuthbertson also did some good things.
I still feel that we really need someone to coach the attack (Iestyn Harris?) since we defended generally very well & stifled any creativity they had which in truth was very little in the absence of Kevin Brown.

Agreed. We could've been better in the first 65 mins yes (tried forcing it a bit too much near the line and came up with a few knock ons) but we've for a long time been a team who work our way into games instead of blasting out of the blocks and Widnes expelled a lot of their energy keeping us contained in the first 40. Widnes seemed to fire through quite a lot of their interchanges in the first 45/50 mins so no surprise what happened in the last quarter.

As for Briscoe, dare I say excellent??? Every try he was involved in he had to produce something very good to turn it into a 4 pointer. Sure we'll also hear other posters also mention good showings from Cuthbertson and Watkins. Also I thought Aiton went well. With Cuthbertson and JJB there we haven't so far needed to flog Peacock and he hasn't been needed to do ridiculous amounts of work (granted still early days and bigger tests to come on that issue). Also with Cuthbertson what I like is that he's not just a big guy who can run and give an offload, he seems to be very communicative organising-wise whilst we're in attack.

Thanks all for the reports

Two very strong second half performances so far this season.

Some great tries in the second half. Nice to see some entertaining Rugby.

Was it just me or did Hicks have a really good game?

Think it's the first time I've every said that!

Don't think he had a good game, but certainly wasn't a poor one either. He allowed the teams too close together, which made it very scrappy, and he took too long before losing his patience with the holding down. And of course the one major incident, the Watkins none knock on, he got it wrong. But in his defence he tried to make the game flow, and I certainly didn't see any scenes of the norm, with people jumping off their seats to shout abuse, which tells you something.

Cuthbertson was great, but at the game I couldn't see how Briscoe didn't get MOM, and yes Printer he was excellent. Hardaker too was very very good. I thought Aiton went really well. Sinfield came to life when he switched to hooker, then carried it on when further switched, was awful in first half. Thought Singleton had a good spell. Still think there is an issue with the left side, just not clicking, and Ablett nowhere near the standards he's set previous seasons, in the first two games.

I think that if you drop the ball but mansmanage to connect your foot with it is technically a knock on. You sometimes get away with it, but the correct call imo.

I thought achurch went really well. We look well balanced with 3 second rowers who can move the ball as well as cart it up.
Was nice to see Yates on. He did 10 minutes and didn't look knackered. Kylie may find it hard to get back in

Some of those tries were good to see and we dispatched Widnes pretty effectively, a fairly high error count not withstanding. Attacking-wise, it'd be nice to think that we'd be prepared to play with the levels of confidence and quickness we showed in the last 20 mins against more lofty opponents - having done the hard yards first of course. Best I've seen Briscoe play for a while, mentions also for Watkins, Cuthbertson and Achurch. And good to see Yates debut too.

As others have pointed out, I thought Hicks had a decent game. My feeling at the time was that he'd blown quickly for a knock on and indicated the feed before belatedly realising the ball had been kicked. Either way, the simple answer is to not drop passes then the ref doesn't come into the equation. If I was going to be hyper-critical, his 10 metres weren't policed tremendously well but I can live with that as long as it applies to both sides.

The Eagle is right, the Watkins knock on was, unfortunately the correct call. He knocks the ball forward then sticks his boot on the end of it.

The incident was not without ambiguity and could have quite easily gone the other way but IMO Hicks got it right on this occasion.

"Highlights" are on the rhinos website now, tho they appear to have allowed a 5 year old child to film them... www.therhinos.co.uk/matchdaytv/? ... a&id=20242 In particular Briscoes running throughout the game seems to have been so elusive that the camera entirely missed him

"Highlights" are on the rhinos website now, tho they appear to have allowed a 5 year old child to film them... www.therhinos.co.uk/matchdaytv/? ... a&id=20242 In particular Briscoes running throughout the game seems to have been so elusive that the camera entirely missed him

Hats off to the Coach who after numerous discussions with him he finally takes my advice and drops Burrow.
He then puts Sutcliffe on the bench and moves Sinfield to hooker.


Now can you have a word with the captain and tell him he needs to make his passing from dummy half much more crisper.
I will let you know when Mulhern needs to replace Kylie Mr McDermott

Having had time to mull over the game since last night & in addition to my earlier comments I agree that Hicks had a decent game albeit somewhat slow to deal with their tactics at the PTB.
Our discipline overall was excellent as was our defence &, as has been said, that stifled their attack, ground them down & allowed us to score freely at the end.
Hardaker continues to look as safe as houses under the high bomb but he was put under very little pressure.
Good to get a comfortable win at HQ after so many losses in front of a decent crowd.

The big thing Hicks got wrong was the massively forward pass for Sinfield's try, but we won't talk about that



Good to see JP being used more sparingly, and as others have said Briscoe, Hardaker and Aiton all very good.

Yep, I thought the pass to Sinfield looked forward though for a change I was watching the game from the North stand and couldn't be sure. The fact that there was not a whisper of protest from the South had persuaded me my eyes were mistaken



All in all a decent-ish performance with some grounds for being optimistic that our period of transition might be slightly less lumpy than feared.

I think Hicks did quite well in terms of "the calls". The problem was his interpretation of holding down. It made (or at least contributed to) the game very slow and sloppy to start with. He also did that thing which just infuriates everyone. Where he allows a lot of holding down/interference at the ptb, then penalises a couple of very soft incidences of it and then goes back to not penalising again.

Hicks getting back for 10 then taking two steps forward was confusing. Was that the 10 mark or what?

The refereeing I've seen this season seems better than last (James Child in the Widnes-Wigan game aside).

On the abuse side, the officials get much more when Leeds are losing, one of the reasons we have left the South Stand for the paddock.

From going to the game my main observations were Aiton is playing well. Briscoe is having a very good start to the season, indeed that whole side looks to be going well. Achurch had a good stint. Thought sinny went well. And Cuthbertson looks to be a very good signing

Widnes were dire.

Leeds went through the motions in the first half and rapidly went through the gears as the game went on. Widnes couldn't. From last week the defence was better organized but we were against some poor attacking opposition. Widnes has nothing in their locker, was all one out, only time they moved the ball was on the last when they looked for some space outwide only for one of their three quarters to kick poorly infield. It was a terrible tactic, but one they stubbornly stuck to time and time again when it wasn't working. Why they wanted to keep the ball in field and go toe-to-toe with Leeds on fitness is beyond me. They'd have been better served disrupting Leeds' flow and mastering some decent field position and time sapping scrums. Maybe the loss of Brown left them a bit leaderless.

As for Leeds, I was pleased to see Sinfield at hooker and some of the kicks he got away from that position were quite brilliant. It was nice to see McGuire and ebb and flow, constantly opting for the switch of play. And whilst Cuthbertson was mentioned for his offloads, his workrate in tackle was just as impressive.

Agree with all that. I think Widnes' woes were, in large part, down to the absence of Kev Brown.