Leeds set to peakon top of the world

(GETTY IMAGES)

The Leeds coach, Brian McClennan, has torn up the rule book during the build-up to tonight's World Club Challenge against Melbourne Storm at Elland Road.

If there is one platitude that can be counted upon from coaches and players alike, it is about the need to concentrate on "one game at a time".

Instead, the Rhinos have committed heresy by consciously treating their early-season fixtures as a preparation for this evening's major test. The result has been four straight victories – five if you count the win over South Sydney in Jackonsville, Florida – and a four-point lead at the top of Super League. No British club have gone into a World Club Challenge in better shape.

"Brian has said that we would use each game as a preparation and get better with each game, building up to this," says Gary Hetherington, the Leeds chief executive largely responsible for installing McClennan as Tony Smith's successor this season.

The consensus at Headingley is that the New Zealander, with his natural exuberance, has freshened things up, but it would be a sorry caricature to regard him as wholly instinctive, as against Smith's meticulous approach. The step-by-step policy for this fixture is proof that, as he has insisted recently, he is "a man with a plan".

That plan suffered a minor setback this week when Ian Kirke pulled a hamstring in training. His place on the bench goes to a young forward of similar calibre in Nick Scruton.

Otherwise, Leeds' side is exactly as it was the night in October they swept St Helens aside in the Super League Grand Final at Old Trafford – another luxury no other coach has had in this fixture.

No wonder the Rhinos are hot favourites to win. Among the Storm's absentees are four of their stars, Clint Newton and Matt King, who are now with English clubs, the injured Greg Inglis and Cameron Smith, who is at home awaiting fatherhood.

In their places are some unfamiliar names, like the 19-year-old centre Will Chambers, with only five first-grade games behind him, and the stand-off Russell Aitken, a year older and only marginally more experienced.

McClennan and his senior players are too wise and weathered to read too much into that. After all, a year ago few had heard of Israel Folau and he is now described as the "new Mal Meninga". Folau is only 18 and can be close to unstoppable with the ball in hand. But Leeds will have been interested in the defensive uncertainties exposed by Halifax, of National League One, in the Storm's warm-up match last Friday.

For all that, the huge centre remains a potential match-winner. "Everything you have heard about him is true," says another who falls into that category, the mercurial full-back, Billy Slater.

Slater once gave up rugby league for a year to work in a racing stable and there is something of the colt on the gallop about the way he runs the ball out of defence. The chance to compare him and the equally dashing Brent Webb should be one of the highlights, although as Slater points out, they will not necessarily come into direct contact very often.

Another key contest should be at scrum-half between the elusive Rob Burrow, such an important contributor to Leeds' cause last season, and the Storm captain, Cooper Cronk, who is more of an organiser and strategist. Burrow has been waiting since the start of the season for the 100th try of his career and there could be no better time and place to claim it than at Elland Road tonight.

Leeds United's ground should be close to capacity for a game which has now established its worth on the international calendar. It even has the power to transcend the bitterest rivalry in the game, with the Bradford chairman, Peter Hood, urging Bulls fans to get behind the Rhinos.

Leeds: Webb; Smith, Toopi, Senior, Donald; McGuire, Burrow; Leuluai, Diskin, Peacock, Jones-Buchanan, Ellis, Sinfield. Substitutes: Bailey, Scruton, Ablett, Lauitiiti.

Melbourne: Slater; Turner, Chambers, Folau, Quinn; Aitken, Cronk; Lima, Geyer, White, Smith, Hoffman, Johnson. Substitutes: Kaufusi, Blair, Manu, Tagataese, MacDougall, Tolman.

Referee: A Klein (Keighley).

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