The league leaders Castleford were slight favourites with the bookies as they headed to Headingley to take on the Leeds Rhinos side who were keen to narrow the Tigers league lead to four points and depending on Salford’s result to go second.

Both sides were without a number of key players but on paper were evenly matched coming into the fixture which many pundits thought was too close to call.

The Rhinos haven’t beaten the Tigers in the last six meetings, and Castleford have won the two encounters this season by a comfortable margin with a big 66-10 win at the Mend-a-Hose Jungle back in March and a 29-18 win in Newcastle at the Magic Weekend.

A horrendous mistake from Castleford gifted the Rhinos the opening try of the game on seven minutes when a Danny McGuire grubber was picked up by Ben Roberts close to his own dead ball line but trying to get out of trouble the Tigers stand-off passed the ball into the hands of Ash Handley to score. Liam Sutcliffe squeezed the ball inside the near upright.

On thirteen the Tigers opened their account when Greg Eden crossed in the corner after the referee had wiped the tackle count down after Paul McShane had the ball stripped in the tackle. The Leeds defence had momentarily switched off, and a passing move saw the ball worked to Eden’s wing. Luke Gale kicked brilliantly from the touchline and Danny McGuire protested too vocally and saw a yellow card from referee Hicks.

The Rhinos survived the McGuire sin-bin but on thirty-two minutes Jamie Jones-Buchanan was penalized for offside near his own line and Gale kicked the penalty to edge his side 8-6 ahead.

On thirty-four Eden looked to have got his second when he picked up a fumbled high kick but the try was ruled out for an offside.

The Rhinos finished the half on the attack but as Matt Parcell crashed over to score the hooter was adjudged to have sounded just before the last play the ball and the score was denied.

Five minutes into the second half and Zak Hardaker scored a special try when he picked up a Leeds kick and went from his own thirty, stepped past two Leeds tacklers, outpaced Liam Sutcliffe and romped over the line to score. Gale added the conversion to put his side eight points ahead of the Rhinos.

On fifty-one the Tigers went in again when Grant Millington grounded a Luke Gale grubber. Gale added the two and eased Castleford into a 20-6 lead.

The Rhinos got back into it on the hour mark when a McGuire grubber caused chaos in the Tigers defence and Adam Cuthbertson picked up the loose ball to take two steps over the line to score. Sutcliffe kicked the conversion for 12-20.

Foul play from Leeds cost another penalty and two points from the boot of Gale on seventy and he added a drop-goal from ten metres out on seventy-seven for the last points of the game to seal a 23-12 win.

Castleford made it three out of three in 2017 against their arch enemies Leeds, and extended their lead at the top of the table to seven points, pushing the Rhinos down into fourth spot. The game was closer than the score line suggests, but there was a noticeable difference between the free flowing play of the Tigers and the more stilted but measured play of the Rhinos. The Rhinos seemed overly ‘pumped up’ for this game, and in the end some indiscipline was what cost them dear.

Rhinos: Sutcliffe (2G), Briscoe, Watkins, Hall, Handley (T), Moon, McGuire (SB), Galloway, Parcell, Singleton, Jones-Buchanan, Ward, Ferres. Subs: Cuthbertson (T), Walker, Garbutt, Mullally.

Tigers: Hardaker (T), Hitchcox, Webster, Minkin, Eden (T), Roberts, Gale (5G, DG), Milner, McShane, Millington (T), Foster, McMeeken, Sene-Lefao. Subs: Massey, Patrick, Holmes, Springer.

Referee: Robert Hicks.

Half-Time: 6-8.

Full-Time: 12-23.

Attendance: 18,029.