McDermott excited by cup progress

Leeds’ boss Brian McDermott says he’s excited to have the opportunity to reach the Challenge Cup final for the third time in four years.

The Rhinos eased into the last four with a comfortable 58-0 victory over Featherstone and McDermott was delighted with his team’s performance.

“I’m pleased for the players,” he said. “We are on a journey. We are eighty minutes from Wembley so it’s good.

“Each year, it is a year on it’s own. It’s just a great build-up – it’s a great place to be and the whole week building up to it and the memories with it. It is something that you don’t need motivation for the players.

“It was a good workout for forty minutes – if we had gone 18-0 ahead (at half-time), it would have made us a bit more nervous. We didn’t get away from them until they got a sin-bin really.

“Credit to Featherstone, I don’t mean that in a condescending way, they stayed with the pace of the game. We scored some really good tries but to be fair we were against a tired defence.

“It looked like a Super League game – it was like a Super League tempo and I thought it was a fast game in the first half.”