Huddersfield Giants boss Ian Watson shuts down play-off talk as he provides injury update

Huddersfield's top-six hopes appeared to be over following eight defeats in nine games but they are hitting form at the business end of the season to leave them just four points adrift of the play-off positions.

Watson, though, has urged the Giants to continue to ignore the bigger picture after benefiting from a change of approach.

"That's great but we're just focusing week by week at the moment," he said on inching closer to the top six.

"We've said it for a few weeks now that we're looking at every single game that we're coming up to.

"We knew we had some home games coming up but it wasn't about looking at a block of games which we've done in the past; it's about taking one game at a time and seeing where that takes us.

"It'll be no different next week for Castleford. We've just got to regroup and go again rather than thinking we've won three games and are doing well."

The 19-12 win came at a cost after Jermaine McGillvary, who opened the scoring with his 249th career try, and Luke Yates were forced off in the second half.

"Jermaine looks like he's done his hamstring which isn't great," added Watson.

"Jez is usually pretty good because he's experienced at being able to catch it if he feels something. We're unsure where that is this time.

"Yates' ankle looks pretty swollen. We'll have to see the extent of that."

The result dents Hull's play-off chances after a run of seven wins in 10 games.

Tony Smith was left to rue an ineffective attacking performance one purple patch aside that yielded tries for Adam Swift and Brad Fash.

"It was average in terms of performance from us," said Smith, who confirmed Liam Sutcliffe fractured a finger and Cam Scott was forced off with cramp.

"We were scrappy again, particularly with the ball. I didn't think we were too bad defensively. We had a couple of lapses but not too drastic. I thought our defence was fairly sound and when it got unlocked a couple of times, we paid a price for it I suppose.

"I didn't think our attack was very potent. We had a period of about 10 minutes where I thought we got on top of our opponents and I think we might have got carried away with that, thinking we were just going to play that way for the remainder of the game."