Leeds Rhinos are back in Super League action on Friday night fresh from winning the Challenge Cup last weekend. They take on St Helens in a huge heavyweight battle with massive implications on the top four.
Leeds are in top spot going into the match and already have a spot in the playoffs secured but they will want a home semi-final which provides their motivation for the next couple of weeks.
St Helens saw Castleford lose on Thursday night and a win here will pull them away from the Tigers in the race for the final playoff spot. A defeat leaves the two sides with three matches to decide who joins Leeds, Wigan and Huddersfield in the postseason.
The Rhinos bashed up Hull KR in the Challenge Cup final at Wembley last weekend and from what we’ve seen in recent weeks the only thing that might stop them here is complacency or tiredness. They look head and shoulders the best side in the competition right now.
St Helens haven’t won a match since the Super 8s began. They’ve now lost four on the spin including one to Leeds in the Challenge Cup semi-final so they needed the break for the cup final to locate their mojo and get their season back on track. We’ll find out here if they have managed to do it or not.
Leeds have made just one change to their squad from last week. Ash Handley misses out and is replaced by Josh Walters. St Helens will have their captain Jon Wilkin back and that should be a huge boost for them. Matty Dawson misses out though.
These two sides have met three times this season and Leeds have won all three times. In truth none of the matches have been particularly close but I suspect this one might be closer than the others purely because of the fatigue factor that has to come into place for the Rhinos even though they won so easily last week.
Given that I think last week might have taken something out of Leeds I’m going to back the Rhinos in a half time handicap rather than a match one. A theme of the meetings between the two sides this season have been the fast starts Leeds have got off to.
They’ve had leads of 28-6, 22-0 and 12-4 at half time against the Saints this season and while the Saints know a fast start is coming from Leeds it is one thing to know it is coming, it is another entirely to stop it.
Apart from when Leeds rested a number of players against Hull two weeks ago you have to go back to early July for the last time they didn’t lead by more than four at half time in the Super League and at even money I’ll take the Rhinos to be a score ahead at the break safe in the knowledge any second half tiredness won’t cost me a win.
Back Leeds (-4) Half time handicap for a 4/10 stake at 2.00 with Ladbrokes
Blog RL YTD: +3.89pts
