Huddersfield Giants 36 Castleford Tigers 24: Giants showing early signs of their potential

Coach Ian Watson’s men have lost just once in those five rounds and, while St Helens are currently playing at a different level to everyone else in Super League, they sit second in the table following a thrilling, if bizarre, 36-24 home win over Castleford Tigers.

For the first 40 minutes at least, Huddersfield were excellent.

They moved the ball around nicely, kept errors and penalties to a minimum and scored three tries against a Tigers side who weren’t in the contest.

At half-time, Huddersfield led 18-0 and the only question to be answered in the final 40 minutes, it seemed, was how many they would score.

Castleford, though, came out for the second period with a resilience and spirit which had been lacking in the first and, incredibly, with a quarter of the game remaining were in the lead.

It has been a difficult start to the campaign for Tigers’ new coach Lee Radford and their record is a mirror image of Giants’, four losses and one win.

However, while Huddersfield have been able to field a consistent side with only limited changes, Tigers have lost a number of influential players, including two of their spine, full-back Niall Evalds and scrum-half Danny Richardson.

That has clearly had an effect on their performances so far, though they beat Hull with an even more makeshift lineup six days before the visit to Huddersfield. In the second half, with the game effectively gone, they had no choice but to chance their arm and it worked.

For 20 minutes, Castleford tore Giants apart, through the middle and on the left-flank.

They ran in four tries, all converted by Gareth O’Brien and suddenly, with time running out, they had a six-point lead and all the momentum.

One incident, though, swung the game back in the home team’s favour.

With 17 minutes left, George Lawler, the prop-forward who has been filling in at hooker, was sent to the sin-bin for a dangerous tackle, reducing Castleford to 12 men for the second time in the match.

Earlier, Jake Trueman had received a yellow card for pulling back Chris McQueen and Huddersfield scored their third try during his time off the field.

Later in the first period, Giants’ Danny Levi, in his first match back from a two-game suspension, was sin-binned for a late hit on Joe Westerman and, soon after his return, team-mate Jermaine McGillvary was banished for a similar offence, against O’Brien.

Castleford scored one try when Levi was absent and two with McGillvary off the field, so the yellow cards had already had a major bearing on the game.

Immediately after Lawler’s departure, Ricky Leutele, Huddersfield’s left-centre, scored a well-taken try which Will Pryce converted – for the fourth of his six goals – to level the scores.

Tigers were still playing with 12 when Leutele, who received excellent service from half-back OIiver Russell, crossed again to edge his side back in front.

Leutele completed a genuine hat-trick, three successive touchdowns, to seal the win in the final moments and it is a shame he wasn’t the focus after the match.

Instead, the four sin-binnings was the dominant topic, with both coaches feeling they had too much influence on the outcome, though Radford did not blame them for his side’s defeat.

It is difficult for referees, who are implementing a zero tolerance policy devised to protect players’ long-term health and they are damned if they do and damned if they don’t.

Most of them are opting for the former policy and the result of matches is now being determined by who can keep more players on the field for longer.

During their first half dominance, Owen Trout, Luke Yates and McGillvary crossed for Huddersfield.

Tigers’ try scorers were Trueman, with their first and fourth, Mahe Fonua and Greg Eden.

“Castleford need a bit of credit,” Watson said. “They upped it and brought it to us at the start of the second half. “We dropped off and made errors to put ourselves under pressure and Cas capitalised when we went down to 12 men.”

Huddersfield Giants: Lolohea, McGillvary, Cudjoe, Leutele, I Senior, Pryce, Russell, Hill, Levi, Trout, Roberts, McQueen, Yates. Substitutes: English, Greenwood, A O’Brien, Ikahihifo.

Castleford Tigers: G O’Brien, Eden, Turner, Fonua, Olpherts, Trueman, McShane, Smith, Lawler, Matagi, Sutcliffe, Blair, Westerman. Substitutes: Watts, Edwards, Hepi, Robb.

Referee: James Child (Dewsbury).