BY DAVID KUZIO
HUDDERSFIELD interim coach Luke Robinson believes the Giants have a ready-made replacement for Luke Yates already at the club.
Yates – who was initially supposed to join Warrington at the start of the 2025 Super League season – departed the Giants last month to join Sam Burgess and his team immediately.
With Huddersfield already struggling with a number of big-name players out for the season, the departure of Yates has left a huge hole in his forward line, but Robinson insists Harry Rushton is the man to replace him.
Rushton seems to have been around for a while following his time at Wigan and Canberra. But he is only 22 and Robinson feels he has a bright future in the game and at Huddersfield in particular.
“We promoted him to the leadership group,” said Robinson.
“He is quite quiet and he leads more by his actions.
“He does talk, and when he talks people do listen. He is becoming more of a leader for us.
“You do forget how young he is because he has been at Wigan and gone over to Canberra and back again; you forget that he is only in his early twenties. He is only going to get better for it.
“He has been so good for us in difficult times. He has had to put his hand up. Let’s be honest, we lost our captain, our 80-minute middle in Luke Yates.
“When you lose the likes of him and then Olly Wilson and Joe Greenwood, along with others, he (Rushton) had to stand up and he has done, as he did against Wigan.”
Robinson admits to feeling a degree of anger that the Giants were unable to hold on to Jake Wardle and it still hurts him to see Wardle line up against Huddersfield last Thursday night.
Jake, the younger brother of Joe Wardle, was part of the Giants’ Academy set-up and was coached by Robinson for some time. In an ideal word he would love Wardle to still be with the club.
“That breakaway try (from Wardle) was a bit of a killer,” added Robinson.
“It infuriates me that he’s playing against us. I think he’s the best English centre in the comp at the moment.
“Jake was in my Academy. He had been out for about two years and in his first game back he scored four or five tries. He is quality.”
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