Leeds front-rower Tom Holroyd is enjoying the best season of his nine-year professional career. The 25-year-old aims to end his eye-catching 2026 on a high, with a Grand Final trophy and a seat on the plane to the World Cup Down Under.

SUPER-SUB. Impact player. Middle enforcer. Call him what you want, but there’s no denying Tom Holroyd’s electric form this year. With Leeds Rhinos currently top of Super League, fighting it out for the League Leader’s Shield and a place at Old Trafford, his team-mates have been getting most of the plaudits.

Jake Connor pulling the strings at half-back. Maika Sivo barging over for try after try after try. Brodie Croft opening up defences, Ash Handley breaking tackles out wide, Kallum Watkins cutting down ball carriers in the second row and so on. But all that isn’t possible without a hard-working forward pack, and a front row that dominates the middle third of the field.

Enter the Wadsworth warrior Holroyd. With Keenan Palasia and Mikolaj Oledzki setting the tone from the start, it has been Holroyd’s job to maintain that tone and keep up the intensity when he spells them and comes off the bench. And it’s a role the 25-year-old Calderdale product has filled to a tee.

From 19 appearances in Super League, 13 of those coming as a substitute, Holroyd is averaging 10.2 carries, 19.8 tackles and 75.3 metres. A strong ball-runner and effective defender, not to mention 116 kilograms of pure power, he has been one of the underrated keys to Leeds’ remarkable rise up the table this year.

The man himself puts his great form down to two things – the influence of coach Brad Arthur, and a demanding pre-season spurred on by the disappointment of missing out on last year’s long-awaited Ashes series.

“This season’s been really good,” Holroyd explains to Rugby League World.

“It’s been obviously a good season for the team as well, which is pretty positive, and I’m just enjoying the time under Brad, really learning each week. I think just the detail that he’s added to the games is going quite a long way… I’m enjoying it.”

The individual impact of the experienced Australian Arthur, who has been coaching for nearly three decades and had 11 seasons in charge of the Parramatta Eels, on the front-rower is clear. Arthur joined Leeds in 2024 and each year has incrementally improved the Rhinos.

“We do quite a lot of video work and I’m just constantly learning and just fine-tuning my game. I’ve worked a lot on my fitness and each day I just try to take it as it comes and optimise everything that I can get out of it.

“I’ve been doing extras after training on my skill set and just try to develop each day.

“Brad’s been brilliant for me personally, because I appreciate someone that says it how it is. He means everything he says because he’s so genuine with it. You listen and take it on board and it makes you want to be better.

“I think that it reflects on how well the team’s gone this year, on what everyone thinks of Brad. We’re all pretty happy that he stayed.”

Holroyd admits missing out on the England squad for the Ashes affected him, and made him even more determined to start pre-season last year in the best shape possible.

“It was a blow. But I did have an injury at the back end of that year,” he concedes.

“In pre-season Brad challenged us and after I got the setback of not being selected in that Ashes team, I just said to Brad I’m pretty hungry now and I want to go after it.

“So I came into pre-season really fit. I didn’t really take much of a break in the off-season. I just wanted to get my head down and get to work really and try and set myself up well for this year.

“I think coming into the pre-season fit helped me and then, with the repeat efforts in the wrestle room, the running fitness and the conditioning games that Brad’s given us, it’s gone a long way to set me up for the season.

“And now coming into the back end of the year I still feel like that I’ve got that under my belt at the start, so I’m just ending the season pretty nicely. It feels like I’m coming into my own at the right time of the year.”

Confidence is dripping throughout the squad at Headingley this year, as evidenced by Leeds’ comeback win over Wakefield at Belle Vue in August. The Rhinos have been remarkably consistent and have long sat in top spot. A burning desire to bring silverware back to the city, six years after the club last won a trophy, is not lost on Holroyd.

“I was really proud of that performance against Wakefield. It just showed how much grit we have as a team. I was like, we want it. Leeds haven’t had silverware for a little while now, so I think everyone’s hungry for that. It just showed a lot about where we’re at as a team.

“The League Leader’s Shield would be my first bit of silverware, so it would mean a lot. Even if it does get overlooked, it’s hard to overlook being the best team all year. Just that consistency of being the best team at the end and sitting top, it’s something to be proud of.”

Leeds’ last Grand Final appearance came in 2022, against St Helens at Old Trafford. The club’s last trophy win was in 2020, when the Rhinos prevailed against Salford at Wembley in the Challenge Cup Final.

Holroyd was still earning his stripes in those years as a youngster, and has yet to experience the cauldron of a Grand Final or the national stadium.

“Obviously it would be absolutely massive for me personally to get to the Grand Final,” he says.

“You dream of those moments, the big games. I want to be a part of that. I feel like I’m ready for that now and to take that challenge on.

“But Leeds deserve to be there. Leeds are a big club and the players owe it to the club,  the fans and the city to be there”

Super League ambitions aside, the prop also has dreams of participating in his first World Cup. Holroyd has represented England at both Under-16 and Under-20 levels, and then made his senior debut against France in 2023 at Warrington.

“That was amazing,” he reflects.

“It was an amazing day. I played my amateur rugby with Morgan Smithies, so it was pretty nice to link up with him again when we got the chance. We both made our debut in the same game, so that was really nice. The whole week was special. And there were quite a few debutants for that week. Yeah, it was a dream come true.”

That was under Shaun Wane, but now the England coaching baton has been handed to Brian McDermott. Holroyd has history with McDermott, as the former Bradford front-rower was in charge of Leeds in 2018 when he made his first-team debut for the Rhinos.

“I made my debut under Brian and then he left shortly after,” he explained.

“It was very brief, [but] I remember I had a good chat with him. I was part of the warm-up squad when we went over to Catalans. I played in the academy game and then I got called in as the 18th man, and had a good chat with Brian after.

“He’s a really genuine guy. And you could see why he had the success that he did at Leeds in the time he had there. He’s just a guy that demands respect.

“So it wasn’t really a shock that he’s got the England job because you can just see that he demands the best out of people.”

Competition is strong in the front row for England. Oledski, Ethan Harvard, Alex Walmsley, Mike McMeeken and Owen Trout were all in the Ashes squad last year, while the likes of Caleb Hamlin-Uele, Max King, Ben Talty and Luke Thompson were also named in McDermott’s 38-player England performance programme in June.

Holroyd didn’t make the cut, and the odds are arguably against him making the World Cup. But the Siddal product knows that if he keeps performing for Leeds each week, keeps doing the hard yards and making the tough carries, he will give himself his best chance of earning a spot in the national set-up in Australia.

“I want to be part of the World Cup,” Holroyd says.

“But the way I’m looking at it at the minute is, if I do my job for Leeds and keep working hard and bringing out good performances that help my team, and if we end up winning something. Then if, off the back of that, I’m in that World Cup team by doing a good job for my club, it’s a win-win scenario.

“So I’ll just keep my head down, keep working hard and working on my game and we’ll just see what falls off the back of it, really.”

Maya Angelou once said: “Nothing will work unless you do.” It’s an adage that Tom Holroyd certainly understands. Humble, hard-working, determined – and with these qualities as his foundation, Holroyd will go far.

First published in Rugby League World magazine, Issue 524 (September 2026)