Maika Sivo took his season’s tally to 22 tries as Leeds weathered a fightback in Toulouse to climb back to the top of the Betfred Super League table with a 48-24 victory in France.
The Rhinos, who at one point led 30-0, were ahead within three minutes when stand-off Brodie Croft made the most of the Toulouse defence’s failure to deal with Jake Connor’s kick, and the scrum-half added the conversion.
Winger Sivo was handed a 17th-minute walk-in in the corner by Ash Handley’s quick hands, and centre Harry Newman powered his way over five minutes later with Connor converting both to make it 18-0.
Fergie McCormack made no mistake after full-back Cesar Rouge had spilled another high ball from Connor, who duly obliged with the extras, and Newman repeated the dose seven minutes before the break after Luke Polselli had faltered under another aerial assault with Connor on target once again.
However, the hosts reduced the deficit on the stroke of half-time when Rouge’s line break allowed Thomas Lacans to go over, and Jake Shorrocks’ kick made it 30-6 at the break.
The French side clawed their way to within 18 points when Polselli collected Benjamin Laguerre’s kick-through within seconds of the restart and Shorrocks made it two from two from the touchline.
Lacans went over with 48 minutes gone to further boost Toulouse’s hopes of an unlikely comeback, and they were right back in it six minutes later when Laguerre accepted Polselli’s pass and went over in the corner after McCormack had knocked on, with Shorrocks again on target.
Sivo steadied Leeds’ nerves when he claimed his second of the night before Chris Hankinson and replacement Cameron Smith made sure with their side’s seventh and eighth tries respectively as time ran down, Connor maintaining his perfect record with the boot to finish with 16 points.
Asked what he was thinking when Olympique got back to within six points, Leeds head coach Brad Arthur told Sky Sports: “I was excited about the challenge.
“They were playing with energy, everything was sticking and the bounce of the ball was going their way, so I was really excited to see, ‘righto, where are we at? How can we get back on top of this game? Can we show some composure or do we panic?’.
“Full credit to the boys, they showed composure, led by Jake (Connor), and we didn’t panic, and that just shows another evolution in our game and a bit of growth in our game.”
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Rhinos sporting director Ian Blease is this week’s guest on The Bench with Jenna Brooks and Jon Wilkin
Toulouse head coach Sylvain Houles said: “Obviously when you play Leeds Rhinos and it’s 30 points, the gap, to come back is always tough.
“It’s been the same story when we are playing those top-six teams. I look at the Wigan game, Hull KR games – we always fall down and try to come back, and we do. We manage, we’re brave, we fight hard, we show a lot of resilience, but we need to make sure we don’t fall that far.”
2026 Super League – key dates and what to look out for
- Magic Weekend: July 4-July 5
- Rivals Round reversed: July 23-July 26
- Elimination Play-offs: September 19-September 20
- Play-off semi-finals: September 26-September 27
- Grand Final: October 3, Old Trafford
Sky Sports will again show every game of the Super League live this season – including two matches in each round exclusively live, with the remaining five matches each week shown on Sky Sports+
