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Brian McClennan saw his Leeds side lose to Castleford on Friday

"I told the boys at half-time they were in a good quality game. It was down to our halves. They controlled the game. It's a massive turnaround from losing 76-12 last year," he told me.

Some fans have since asked for an update on Matterson's hand injury - he lost a finger in bizarre pre-season circumstances, as referenced in my first blog of the year.

It is fair to say the mild-mannered Matterson doesn't like to talk about his own problems. His hand remains heavily-bandaged, and he was clearly conscious of that as he faced the media for his post-victory briefing at Headingley. "How is it?" I asked him as we caught up before our formal interview. "It's still not grown back, George!"

Post-match press conferences are often monotonously routine. A series of standard questions from the hacks, a succession of clichéd responses from the coaches. But body language is always enlightening, and occasionally you will get a gem of a synopsis from one of the more animated coaches,

Leeds boss Brian McClennan entered looking like he had just been told his home had been burgled. "Losing sucks. It's just taken us one home match to remind me how much it hurts," he told the assembled media. And he meant it. 'Bluey' was fuming, yet gracious.

"Cas played very well, they tested us and won that test. They won the arm wrestle hands down," he told me as another batch of dirty kits were stuffed into the washing machine.

In the month in which Arsenal have been criticised for over-playing their passes, looking for the perfect goal and suffering if their "one-dimensional" approach yields no rewards, I asked McClennan if he was worried about Leeds' lack of any early-season cutting edge.

"We won't always have that spark," he said "Timing is everything. Cas hussled us more and worked a bit more and earned themselves a lot of ball. We weren't able to get any momentum when we got the ball. We got fatigued. We were down to two subs and we got more and more fatigued and Cas were ruthless."

Leeds weren't helped by a fourth-minute injury to Carl Ablett and the subsequent loss of Brett Delaney, which led to Jamie Jones-Buchanan playing right centre. Both Ablett and Delaney have since had scans but McClennan has revealed a new approach to releasing news on injuries this season, which I find a little baffling.

All injury news will remain confidential, he told me. "It is up to the individual players if they want details of their injuries to be made public. It's something new for this season," he said.

Speaking of new ventures, the Sean Long era at Hull FC began with . Hull's win ensured the Super League's big two both suffered shock home defeats in round one. In fact, it was an awesome first round of fixtures, giving credence to the annual "this will be the best Super League season ever" call that us journos tend to make.

It was also good news for the . They had hoped to shatter attendance records for the opening round with a 60,000+ aggregate. Well, they got their wish. It was a record aggregate of 78,090 for the seven matches, beating last year's 77,944.

Melbourne Storm provide the opposition for Leeds in this year's World Club Challenge

Tip of the hat also to John Kear and , who continued their unbeaten start to sit top of the table. Their means they have now won seven regular rounds of Super League on the spin in a run dating back to last season.

My "Jedward" hairdo dig at Ryan Atkins prompted the predictable backlash. The Wolves centre believed it was rich for me to question his fashion follicles ahead of .

"I think you're just jealous as I have enough hair to do different styles," he wrote on my Facebook page, adding that "last time the Wakey lads saw me chatting to you at the Stoop they thought I was talking to Jim's dad from American Pie!" He's a funny lad, Ryan, but he was unable to notch any of Warrington's 11 tries against Quins. Maybe the hair was weighing him down.

I actually did a double take when I saw the headline on the Super League website that accompanied that Wolves win: "." For an awful moment I sensed some sort of tabloid expose on me, before learning that carrot-topped wingman Chris Riley had run in a stunning quintet of touchdowns.

If you're in the west Yorkshire area on Wednesday, 24 February then it would be great to see you for a night of rugby league chat at Headingley. Ahead of the that Sunday, I'll be hosting which gives fans the chance to put your questions to .

There's a good deal of support behind Leeds for the big game, too.

I had the RFL cameras down at TV Centre in London this week filming a series of good luck messages for the Rhinos as they prepare to take on Australia's top team for the latest England-Aussie bragging rights.

Look out for the special video message on YouTube this week, featuring words of support for Leeds from Tory leader David Cameron, Lib Dem's Nick Clegg, tennis great Boris Becker, my 12pm-2pm radio pal Gabby Logan and, ahem, me.