The Rhinos produced a controlled, accomplished performance at Headingley as they defeated Huddersfield 44-14 in front of 15,517, the largest ever crowd for this fixture in Super League.

Hero of the hour was Rob Burrow who capped a fine performance with his first ever hat trick for the club with some devastating support play.

His electrifying run brought him the first of Leeds’ eight tries after only eight minutes and his second seven minutes later, courtesy of a break by Mark Calderwood, put the leaders 10-0 up.

But Burrow had to wait until the 65th minute to complete his hat-trick as Huddersfield provided some stern resistance.
Teenage winger Bolu Fagborun scored his first Super League try and Chris Thorman kicked two goals as the Giants hit back to make it 10-8.

However, the Rhinos responded with a stunning reply just when they needed to as the half drew to a close.
Gareth Ellis strode majestically through the Giants defence and in-form Keith Senior carved out a long-range try for substitute Liam Botham, who showed a fantastic turn of pace to run clear of the defence.

Sinfield added his third goal of the night to stretch his side’s lead to 22-8.  Huddersfield produced some entertaining rugby and it was no surprise when they scored their second try.

The Rhinos defence, clearly expecting a kick on the last tackle, were caught wrong-footed by a scoot from dummy half by Brad Drew and he demonstrated deceptive pace to cross the line.   Drew put over the conversion to make it 22-14.
But any hope of a shock result receded just as quickly when Rhinos second rower Willie Poching powered his way over at the corner on 56 minutes.

Senior and Bai then combined superbly to get Poching over for his second before Senior broke away to set Burrow up for his hat-trick.  The scoring was completed when second rower Ali Lauitiiti charged over in the closing moments and Sinfield took his goal tally to six from eight attempts.