Brian McDermott praised the attitude of his players, but admitted a slow start cost them dearly.
The Rhinos lost their fifth game of the season after going down 18-14 to Castleford following a late Jake Webster try.
Leeds had come from 12-0 behind to lead 14-12 at the break, but McDermott insisted the poor start did the damage.
“I don’t have any issues with the result,” he said.
“They scored a couple of tries which didn’t really go with the flow of the game. While they have good players and Castleford deserved to score them, I didn’t think it was because they tired us out or they got us on a play we couldn’t handle, we were just off.
“After that I thought we gave it a real go. We gave that game our guts. I don’t have too many issues with the loss and I’m encouraged that there is a group of men that are absolutely trying their hardest and giving the game their guts, but the start there was off for us.”
A full match report will be in next week’s League Express, available online Sunday evening and in stores by Monday.
