
Leeds coach Brian McDermott admitted his side could not handle local rivals Wakefield Trinity in their convincing defeat to Chris Chester’s side on Thursday night.
The Rhinos were outscored six tries to one and well-beaten at the Beaumont Legal Stadium – and McDermott offered up no excuses for his side’s below-par display.
“They (Wakefield) were really good,” he said. “They were up for the fight and doing the tough stuff. We started off okay but we started to look for answers with too many passes and offloads – although that’s not why we lost.
“We made some errors and took some soft options after 15 minutes looking to try and play around Wakefield – after that we didn’t handle how direct they were at us.
“I didn’t sense anything (pre-match). There were some unfortunate, silly tries really which made the scoreline a big scoreline against us – it was a poor loss that.”
McDermott also called for his side to respond next week ahead of an emotionally-charged evening at Headingley for the final game in front of the South Stand, when Leeds play St Helens.
He said: “It’s been a while since we’ve been beaten significantly like that. I know the Challenge Cup was disappointing but it’s been a while since we’ve been that off with our preferred, starting 13. We’ll have to have a reaction next week because St Helens are in form.”