Rhinos hoping banned McGuire has Grand Final return

McGuire will miss Friday’s play-off semi-final against Wigan after being found guilty of a reckless high tackle during the defending champions’ 27-20 win over Catalan Dragons in Perpignan last Friday.

McDermott, who claimed it was a careless challenge by his player, said the club had decided against lodging an appeal after receiving a fair hearing from the three-man committee chaired by high court judge Peter Charlesworth.

But he believes comments by Wane, in which he compared the incident to a tackle that earned Wigan hooker Michael McIlorum a three-match ban, were out of order.

“We considered an appeal,” he said. “There was a bit of merit in doing that. But we thought they gave us a fair hearing. Sometimes you come out thinking you might as well have not turned up but, in fairness to the panel, they listened.

“I felt we put up a good case and I think it went as well as it could have done. If we did anything, we probably got it down from a two-game ban to one game.

“Unfortunately, with what’s been said in the media building up to it, it would have been a tough call to not ban him.

“I’m just not sure that in any legal case you’d be allowed to say what you want in the media building up to it.

“When I talk about other clubs’ players, I talk about how good they are and how they should be involved in Great Britain teams and things like that.”

McDermott also believes the verdict could have serious repercussions for the game, with players fearful of going wholeheartedly into tackles in case they result in a fine and a ban.

The former Bradford and Great Britain forward believes the verdicts are formed by the Rugby Football League’s match-review panel which scrutinise incidents every Monday, with the disciplinary committee effectively acting as an appeals panel.

“I just think that, at the moment, once you enter that room, you are guilty,” he said. “The review panel have been given a set of guidelines and I’d like to talk to the people who run the game. What do they want our game to look like?

“At the moment, players are concerned about going into collisions in case they get it slightly wrong.

“That’s scary for our game. The beauty of our game is that usually, if you run harder and tackle harder than the opposition, you win the game.

“Now, if you run hard and tackle, you worry about getting a ban. Maggsy gets run at every single week by teams that try to exhaust the leading try-scorer in Super League.

“Because of that, Maggsy has to be aggressive and sometimes he gets it wrong. He hasn’t the best tackle technique in the world and never has had but he is tenacious and competitive and sometimes that goes wrong.”

McDermott admitted that the club were deterred from making an appeal in case a different panel opted to impose a two-match ban, the maximum allowed for a grade B offence.

“Should we be good enough to beat Wigan and get through to the Grand Final, we obviously get Maggsy back,” he said.

However, Leeds have lost eight of the 10 matches McGuire has missed this year through injury and suspension and McDermott admitted: “It is difficult to win without him,” he said. “He’s been in sensational form this year.”