Brad Arthur says Leeds ill discipline 'embarrassing' after defeat at Hull FC
“It’s a bit of a reality check. Some of the ill discipline is not what I want our club to be about and be a part of it."
Leeds head coach Brad Arthur launched a scathing attack on his side following their ill-disciplined 24-16 Betfred Super League defeat at Hull FC.
The Rhinos looked unrecognisable from the side that swept aside Hull KR in Las Vegas last month as they coughed up three penalties for dissent in a wretched second-half display.
“Pretty embarrassing, some of the discipline in the second half,” admitted Arthur. “If some of the blokes want to talk to the referee instead of doing our own job, it’s not good enough.
“It’s a bit of a reality check. Some of the ill discipline is not what I want our club to be about and be a part of it.
“We need to get to the bottom of it and find out why, what’s changed? We went well in Vegas – so what? We’ve got ahead of ourselves and think we’re better than we actually are.”
Leeds clawed back from conceding two early tries to lead at the interval after James McDonnell and Brodie Croft both crossed in quick succession.
But apart from a second Jarrod O’Connor penalty, they failed to add to their tally in a desperate second-half display as the hosts took full advantage of their errors to duly end a four-game losing streak.
“I’ve said it a bit about this team, our losses look the same,” added Arthur. “It’s my job to fix that. It’s round five so we’ve got plenty of time, but we can’t be using that as a reason or excuse for too long, we need to fix it.”
Hull FC head coach John Cartwright hailed his side’s “very courageous” display but insisted his side’s poor recent form – which had begun to lead to speculation about his future – had not built extra pressure.
“No-one’s hit a panic button,” Cartwright insisted. “I’m aware people were panicking but within our room there was no-one panicking. Regardless of the result today we knew we had troops coming back and believed in the players who we put out today.
“It’s good for our confidence. It’s hard to block out outside noise – everyone’s human and if you hear it enough it starts to have an effect, but I’m so pleased with the way they turned up today against the form team in the competition and said, ‘no, you’re not coming through us’.”
Cartwright reserved special praise for Jake Arthur – the son of Leeds boss Brad – who scored the opening try and marshalled his team-mates superbly in a rare start at half-back after captain Aidan Sezer was ruled out by an ankle knock in midweek.
“I thought he was great today,” added Cartwright. “He really took the responsibility on, kicked well, defensively was really strong and just his composure in some really tight situations.
“Jake has been playing second to Aidan but his job (today) was to run the team. He was always settling his players down, he stuck to his plan really well and he finished the game strong.”