By leedsrhinos.biz
July 1 2007

It was always going to be Les’ night and consequently, Bradford Bulls’. The Headingley Carnegie Stadium was packed, but that didn’t seem to help as the Rhinos got flattened by the Bulls. We bring you all the action from the round 18 clash in Leeds (read on to understand the headline).

Leeds (8) 14
Tries: Diskin, Smith, Webb
Goals: Sinfield Bradford (14) 38
Tries: Vainikolo, Evans, Tupou, Lynch, Morrison, St Hilaire
Goals: Deacon (7)

This was a game we were never going to win with two clear certainties. First of all, all the 50/50 decisions would go Bradford’s way, and that big Les was going to get a pretty good send off. And four tries of the Bulls shouldn’t of been allowed, although it was sure that Leeds Rugby wouldn’t of being pathetic enough to ask the management over at Odsal to ‘gift’ Rhinos the points. But at least this game didn’t go down to last minute tries like the other two meetings with Bradford this season.

Captain Kev must of lost the toss before the game as we were defending with our back to the Carnegie Stand, facing the sun the strong June sun. Just as we predicted, Vainikolo signed off in style opening the scoring with two Rhinos, Peacock and Webb missing their tackles. Deacon added the extras to fittingly make the score 6-0.

Half way through the first period of play, the Rhinos finally got into the Bradford twenty with some promising attack but the ref called McGuire to of dropped the ball yet the South Stand disagreed. It was play on and Bulls player capitalised and ran down field to be eventually stopped by some tired but strong Rhinos defence. Two plays later and we were penalised for offside and Deacon took the two on offer to make the score 8-0.

Twenty four minutes had passed before the first Leeds try. Leuleui went close yet it was Diskin who got the try from acting half back. Sinfield missed the chance of two more points so the score stayed at 8-6.

The mood lifted in Headingley as we had the chance to go ahead as Senior made a line break rarely seen by him this season but he made the mistake of off loading as the receiver let the ball go to ground.

 With only five minutes remaining a cross field kick from Deacon made its way to Evans with no even the slightest pressure from four Leeds defenders as he went over the whitewash. Deacon converted. The second half was going to be long and hard for the fans, the players and the management of the club.

But in the dying minutes of the first half a superb long Kevin Sinfield pass to Lee Smith secured a try. Sinny once again failed to convert (although he is the most accurate kick in SL) but we were still in this game, even if we weren’t playing to our full potential.

Just twelve minutes into the second half and Bradford added more points to the scoreboard as Tupou went over the white wash in the corner. Watching from the South Stand on the Sky big screen it appeared that he failed to control the ball when he made his way over the line but the video ref didn’t seem to agree with all twenty thousand of the Leeds fans. Just as we said at the start of the article.

This is where things went really wrong for the Rhinos. For a time I thought that we were going to stay in this game but we gift wrapped two tries in just two minutes for big Les’ side.

On sixty Bailey dropped the ball whilst trying to off load on his own twenty metres. Another huge mistake from Leeds which gave Bradford possession which consequently lead to a Lynch try. Deacon added the extras to make the score 26-14.

This was our last chance, but we McGuire threw it away after trying and trying to find a gap in the Bulls ‘wall’ of forwards by passing the ball to no one but a Bradford player. Morrison went over the line and with the extra two it took the score to a shocking 32-14 to now second place Bradford Bulls.

Again the lads did us proud by trying and trying but McGuire once again made a mistake which once again gave the opposition a try. They were queuing up for tries, but this time it was the turn of St Hilaire. 

Well there was definitely not twenty four points between these two sides. Whatever Smith tried, it didn’t pull off.

Oh well. Saints next week! Some people say were not a team, but it seems that the tactics just didn’t work tonight but at least Tony noticed that we were exposed on Lee Smiths wing. He swapped the centres with Senior adding some strength.

My leedsrhinos.biz Man Of The Match has to be Clinton Toopi – for a start, he made a crucial tackle in the first half on Lee Smith’s wing. Yet again another good performance from JJB, pocket rocket and Diskin and this week even Jamie Peacock, former Bulls captain.

If you were leaving via the Kirkstall Lane exit, you’ll of heard Bradford fans singing “Where’s Ganson gone?”. Therefore you’ll understand our title.

Tony Smith said after the game; “We have got St Helens next week and we have some good memories of our last game against them. That was probably our best performance of the season. However, we will review this game on Monday before we look ahead to Saints and another massive challenge for us.
"There were some positives for us out of the game and we will look to build on them and the negative aspects especially give us plenty to work on this week in training," added Smith.

Leeds: Webb, Donald, Toopi, Senior, Smith, McGuire, Burrow, Bailey, Diskin, Peacock, Jones-Buchanan, Ellis, Sinfield.
Replacements: Thackray, Kirke, Leuluai, Tansey.

Bradford: Platt, St Hilaire, McAvoy, Evans, Vainikolo, Solomona, Deacon, Vagana, Newton, Lynch, McKenna, Langley, Morrison.
Replacements: Henderson, Burgess, Tupou, James.

Referee: Phil Bentham (Castleford)

Don’t let Friday’s action put you off from travelling to Merseyside. Let’s hope the lads pull together and put on a brilliant display just like earlier in the season at the Headingley Carnegie (even if Knowsley Road is a dump…)

Crowd: Full house 22k.